The flexible and printed electronics market has attracted a lot of interest from venture capital groups over the years. As is the case with any industry, some of the investments work out, and others fail, and the PE industry has had its shares of hundred million dollar mistakes.
 
Still, there is interest in the field of PE, as is seen in “New Fusions in Advanced Materials Innovation and Corporate Venture Capital,” a recent report by the London Environmental Investment Forum (LEIF). In this report, LEIF discusses its top 12 advanced materials start-ups, five of which have ties to the flexible and printed electronics field.
 
The report noted that the top 10 corporate VC investors in advanced materials have reportedly committed more than $2 billion to this sector over the last five years. Meanwhile, the top 12 advanced material technology businesses in this report have raised more than $150 million in the last two and a half years from corporate venture capital groups.
 
In the report, the importance of advanced materials is clearly explained by Keith Gillard, general partner at Pangaea Ventures, with this comment:
 
“Breakthroughs in advanced materials are becoming increasingly important for companies to excel in almost any market,” Gillard said. “Advanced materials are solving fundamental problems necessary to make products more efficient, sustainable, less expensive, and better performing, key attributes necessary for widespread adoption of any product.”
 
The five PE-related companies, in alphabetical order, are:
• Heliatek, Dresden, Germany company, is successfully developing organic photovoltaic systems.
• Imprint Energy, Alameda, CA, specializes in thin, zinc-based flexible batteries that are disposable and rechargeable.
• Polyera, Skokie, IL, develops flexible transistor technology for wearables, touch screens and displays, and the Internet of Things.
• Smart-Kem, St. Asaph and Manchester, UK, manufactures tru-FLEX semiconductors for flexible and low power wearable, mobile and OLED and LCD large area displays.
• XG Sciences, Lansing, MI, is developing graphene nanoplatelets for conductive inks and coatings that can be used for printed electronics.
 
This recognition shows that the flexible and printed electronics field remains attractive to venture capitalists, and that is money available for investments.