UK's Durham Graphene Science announced plans to go public, and raise up to £10 million (about $16 million) on the UK's AIM stock exchange. The company is also changing its name to Applied Graphene Materials (AGM). They will use the funds to increase production capacity and accelerate commercial opportunities with partners. If successful, AGM will be the world's first pure-graphene company to go public. This will be one interesting IPO to watch!
AGM says that trading is expected to begin next month. The company hopes to achieve a market value of £25 million ($40 million). The company, a spin-off from Durham University, developed a unique and scalable bottom-up CVD approach to synthesize graphene. Their current annual production capacity is one tonne of graphene (I'm assuming these are graphene flakes). The company will upgrade its plant to eight ton capacity (this will take about 18 months).
Interestingly, the company's CEO, Jon Mabbit, posed for the photo you see above, holding Head's YouTek Graphene Speed tennis racket. Those rackets, announced in the beginning of 2013, supposedly use graphene to make the shaft stronger and lighter. I'm guessing this photo more or less confirms that AGM is supplying the graphene material to Head. In any case, Head is offering five different YouTek Graphene Speed models, ranging from $170 to $286.
In June 2013 AGM qualified their graphene production process. Earlier in 2012, they raised $1.8 million in its seed round of financing in February 2012 (valuation was about $3.5 million).