Displays - Page 11

Last month we reported that UK-based Perpetuus Carbon Technologies entered the graphene supply market and will soon start producing graphene materials (GNPs) in its new 100 annual-ton factory. Today Perpetuus launched two new graphene based products (developed in collaboration with Gwent Electronics Group).

The first is a graphene based ink that features a resistance below one ohm per square centimeter. Perpetuus says this is the most conductive graphene enabled ink in the world, and they are already able to immediately deliver single kilogram batches for R&D and manufacturing optimization. The company will be able to offer ton quantities later on. Perpetuus' inks are available in formulations for ink jet, flexographic printing and sensors technologies.

UK-based Perpetuus Carbon Technologies announced that it entered the graphene supply market. The company will soon start production of customer-tailored surface modified graphene materials (excellent quality stacked graphene flakes) in its new 100 annual ton facility. The company can provide 50Kb batches within 48 hours and ton-sized orders within 28 days. The price of their graphene materials is £50 ($83) per kilogram.

The company also holds an R&D arm (called Perpetuus Research and Development). The development activities focus on graphene based ink, and also include transparent condcutive films (for ITO replacement), stress strain actuators and printable coatable electrodes for use in lithium Ion batteries.

The Graphene Research Centre (GRC) at the National University of Singapore (NUS) and BASF announced a new partnership to develop the use of graphene in organic electronics devices - such as OLED devices. The goal of this collaboration is to interface graphene films with organic electronic materials, with an aim to create more efficient and flexible lighting devices.

In this collaboration, the GRC will contribute its graphene knowledge (the synthesis and characterization of the graphene) while BASF is focused on organic materials. Of course BASF is also engaged with graphene research (for several years) and are looking to speed up their device development with this new partnership.

In July we reported that China's Ningbo Morsh Technology is establishing a new graphene production line that will have an annual capacity of 300 tons (or tens of millions of graphene films). The line was supposed to be operational by August 2013, and now there are reports from china that finally production began.

The report further says that China plans to build a state-level graphene industrialization base in China's Chongqing Municipality. Within 5 years, they hope to reach revenues of 100 billion yuan ($16.35 billion). If the capacity is indeed 300 tons per year, than China is now the world's leading graphene producer by far.

Researchers from MIT and the University of California at Berkeley developed a new way to evenly functionalize graphene with oxygen at low (50-80 C) temperatures. The method is environmentally friendly (no harsh chemical treatment) and can be applied on a large scale.

The researchers use low-temperature annealing and this cause the oxygen atoms to form clusters. This leaves areas of pure-graphene between the oxygen clusters. This decreases the graphene's electrical resistance by four to five orders of magnitude (the oxygen clusters are insulating) which is good for applications such as sensing, electronics and catalysis.

A couple of months ago Cientifica raised £241,000 ($389,000) in the UK's stock exchange and the company is now public. According to press releases, Cientifica aims to acquire and build businesses that make use of graphene materials. The company will invest in by buying shares or by buying IP, assets or entering into partnerships of joint-venture arrangements.

Cientifica's CEO Tim Harper was kind enough to answer a few questions I had regarding the company's business and future plans. So first of all - congratulations Tim on the fund raising, the readmission to the AIM and on being the world's first pure-play-graphene applications public company!

The EU launched a new project called GLADIATOR (Graphene Layers: Production, Characterization and Integration) that aims to improve the quality and size of CVD graphene sheets and reduce the production cost.

GLADIATOR directly targets the transparent electrodes market and will demonstrate that ITO can be matched on performance (over 90% transparency and a resistance of less than 10 W/sq) and cost (under 30 €/m²). During the project, they will produce ultraviolet organic photodiodes and large area flexible OLEDs.

The Korean Intellectual Property Office posted some interesting figures today. They report that Korean companies are securing essential patents related to the commercialization of graphene - and several companies are making inroads into graphene production and manufacturing transparent graphene-based displays.

Between 2005 and June 2013 a total of 2,921 graphene-related patents have been applied for in Korea, and the rate is accelerating quickly. 93% of those patents have been applied for by Korean individuals and organizations.

The wall street journal posted an interesting article and video on graphene. The article discusses the current state of research and business, possible graphene applications and the rush to patent related technologies.

The article starts with the Cambridge graphene research center and then discusses several companies and their graphene programs, including IBM, Nokia, BlueStone Global Tech, Vorbeck Materials, Lockheed Martin and Aixtron.

China's Chongqing Morsh Technology is building a production line in Chongqing that will be used to produce 15" single-layer graphene films. They hope to start production by March 2014, and they already signed an agreement with Guangdong Zhengyang, an OGS maker to produce 10 million graphene based transparent conducting films (TCFs) in a year for the next five years. These films will be used to produce touch panels for mobile devices.

Chongqing Morsh was established by the Chongqing Institute of Green and Intelligent Technology. The company is buying graphene from Ningbo Morsh Technology.