IIT Delhi startup develops technology to manufacture affordable antiviral fabric

After three years of rigorous research and development, Fabiosys Innovations, a deep-tech healthcare startup incubated at IIT Delhi, has developed an extremely affordable high-performance medical textile Fabium, which destroys (approx) 99.9% of the bacteria and viruses within 30 minutes.

Ordinary antimicrobial fabric products available in the market inhibit microbes in a span of 24 hours and that too with an unsatisfactory efficiency. This time span of 24 hours makes those antimicrobial fabric products impractical to be used in everyday life because a typical bacterium doubles itself in a span of around 20-30 minutes.

Fabium is developed using a technology called Hi-PAT, which makes it highly effective against bacteria, viruses, and fungi. Fabium starts working within seconds of contact with the pathogens and destroys them within 30 minutes.

Large scale manufacturing of Fabium requires passing the raw cotton fabric through a set of proprietary chemical formulations while using the standard textile-processing machinery, which are commonly available with the Indian textile industry.

The team has successfully completed large scale manufacturing trials in collaboration with a textile industry partner in Delhi-NCR region to ensure that the large scale fabric manufacturing can be done while maintaining its high-efficiency and affordability.

Fabium can be made with any kind of fabric and one of its major USPs is its natural colour, which is 100% white making it suitable for further dyeing, printing, embroidery, and other kinds of designing.

“The affordability of Fabium is due to the technology behind it rather than cheap labour cost. Market research indicates that our cost-effective novel chemical formulation and unique textile processing technology make Fabium comparatively extremely affordable antiviral fabric. We are receiving encouraging responses from the industry for manufacturing and distribution of Fabium products,” said Yatee Gupta, founder, Fabiosys Innovations.

Fabium is free from formaldehyde and metal nanoparticles, which cause toxicity and irritation to the human body. The fabric is rigorously tested as per ASTM D737 Standard for air permeability, which shows that the Fabium is almost as breathable as regular fabrics, which makes it very useful in applications like masks & Coveralls (PPE), where breathability is almost always an issue.

“From a philosophical perspective, we are trying to break the public stereotype that high-quality products will always be expensive. We want to make our infection-proof products as easily available and affordable as a bar of soap. Our mission is to manufacture Fabium at large scale in India itself. We are thankful to the department of Biotechnology; principal scientific advisor to the Government of India; IIT Delhi and FITT, which supported this cause during this crucial moment of time,” said Samrat Mukhopadhyay, mentor to Fabiosys.

Fabiosys was recognised as one of the most promising startups by IIT Delhi Alumni Association having won the IIT Delhi Alumni Faculty & Startup Awards 2021.