Directa Plus - Page 5

Directa Plus recently stated that its revenue has trebled in the first half of 2020, rising from €2.81 million in the six months to the end of June 2020, up from €894,693 in the first half of last year.

This impressive rise in revenue took place despite the constraints imposed by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, or was perhaps even assisted by it - in case some of this revenue rise took place due to Directa's new Co-mask which has gone from concept to production and sale in just a few months.

Directa Plus has signed a letter of intent with high-end furniture manufacturer Poltrona Frau for leather development.

The collaboration will be for an initial two years with the aim of developing a new leather product which will use Directa Plus' graphene technology.

Directa Plus recently signed a technical and commercial agreement with automotive design and engineering firm Italdesign.

The partnership has been signed for an initial nine years to explore, test, and build automotive components that are enhanced by properties of the company's proprietary graphene technology. Applications could include car interiors, paints, and mechanical components.

Directa Plus has announced that its G+ graphene-enhanced facemasks, Co-mask, are now available for retail sale at a new, dedicated website.

Since the dangers of COVID-19 first started to become apparent, Directa Plus has been determined to help with the fight against the disease, and to use the unique properties of graphene and the strength of Directa Plus’s IP portfolio to enhance personal protective equipment. The company redirected effort and resources in its Advanced Development Area, R&D facility, to achieve this, Directa Plus said in a statement.

Highways contractor Amey and its client Kent County Council will be testing Gipave, an Italian graphene-based asphalt supermodifier said to extend pavement life.

The trial is taking place as part of the Association of Directors of Environment, Economy, Planning & Transport (ADEPT) Smart Places Live Labs programme funded by the Department for Transport of the UK.

Directa Plus has reported that a deal to supply a special grade of its G+ graphene product, known as ITC1, to its partner, Iterchimica. The G+ product is the differentiating component of Gipave, an asphalt super-modifier developed by Directa Plus and Iterchimica and follows successful trials in Italy and the UK.

The agreement signed by the companies provides for the exclusive supply of the G+ graphene product to Iterchimica in the asphalt and bitumen sector worldwide and is for an initial duration of three years.

As researchers and companies all over the world set out to battle the Coronavirus pandemic, many are revisiting graphene as a material with potential for helping to win this fight. The reasons for such potential could be found in graphene's known antibacterial/antiviral properties, its beneficial traits for medical sensors and devices and more.

Graphene has been shown in the past as extremely useful for creating various sensors. Earlier this month, a team led by Boston College researchers used a sheet of graphene to track the electronic signals inherent in biological structures, in order to develop a platform to selectively identify deadly strains of bacteria. In October 2019, Rice University team under chemist James Tour transformed their laser-induced graphene (LIG) into self-sterilizing filters that grab pathogens out of the air and kill them with small pulses of electricity. Commercially sold graphene-based sensors exist, like the graphene oxide (GO) sensor developed by the ICN2 Nanobioelectronics and Biosensors group that was added in 2016 to the list products offered by Biolin Scientific, a prestigious instrumentation company devoted to the production of analytical devices. The Q-Sense GO sensor enables interaction studies of GO with various analytes (measured substances) of interest and may open the door to various applications with interest for diagnostics, safety/security and environmental monitoring.

Advanced materials company Directa Plus said its graphene material could be used in medical devices to help authorities combat the Covid-19 pandemic.

The company, whose Italian operations were unaffected by government moves to close down activity not associated with essential goods and services, said its graphene was non-toxic and its bacteriostatic properties could be used in the production of medical devices, such as masks, gloves and gowns to ensure better prevention properties for the spread of the virus.

Directa Plus has reportedly won a second contract for its graphene-enhanced oil contaminant treatment Grafysorber through subsidiary Setcar. The contract is with GSP Offshore, part of the Romanian oil services group GSP, and worth €5 million over a seven-year period.

GSP already has an eight-year agreement with Romanian oil and gas group OMV Petrom, another partner of Directa Plus. Setcar will treat oil-contaminated water and soil, residual drilling fluids treatment and clean oil storage tanks.

Directa Plus has announced that it has received a grant for a project to develop an environmentally sustainable technology to digitally print its G+ graphene product on fabrics.

The GREEN.TEX project partners are Directa Plus, EFI Reggiani, the Italian subsidiary of global digital printing group Electronics For Imaging, Inc. (EFI), and IBS Consulting Group. The project will last for an initial period of 24 months and has a total value of around €1 million, of which Directa Plus will invest €240,000 and receive a grant of €100,000.