As Printed Electronics USA 2013 opens its doors today at the Santa Clara Convention Center, Santa Clara, CA, attendees will learn about the recent advances being made in the field of printed and flexible electronics (PE).

During the conference, which runs through tomorrow and is organized by IDTechEx, there will be an emphasis on the increasing commercialization of PE, with more than 200 presentations scheduled and nearly 160 exhibitors on hand. The focus of the speakers and exhibitors alike will be on the most recent advances in the field of PE, whether it is products, raw materials, equipment or processes.

Day 1 offers four concurrent sessions, with two focused on Printed Electronics. There are four co-located programs: Graphene LIVE!, OLEDs Live!, 3D Printing LIVE! and TCF (Transparent Conductive Films) LIVE! throughout the two days.

“Our primary focus of the event is to help users understand the state of play and how they can use printed electronics,” said Raghu Das, IDTechEx’s CEO.

The speakers include leaders from major companies including P&G, Johnson & Johnson, Colgate Palmolive, NASA, Autodesk, OSRAM, Oxylane, Chrysler, Microsoft and others. There will also be leading innovators in the PE field.

“We feature companies discussing the state-of-the-art in the full range of components, from the usual displays, logic, sensors, power to emerging topics such as 3D printing, stretchable electronics, supercapacitors, smart packaging, wireless power transfer, the Internet of Things and much more,” Das added.

Today’s session begins with an overview by Das on “Printed Electronics: Show Me the Money!” Other presenters include Scott Sloss, principal engineer – Core Science and Engineering, Lifescan – a Johnson & Johnson Company; Dr. Karl Willis, principal research engineer, Autodesk Consumer Group; Mike Lu, director OLED technology, Acuity Brands Lighting; Dr. Marc Vermeersch, Total’s solar technology and strategy – senior advisor; Dr. Thomas Wehlus, senior R&D manager, OSRAM Opto Semiconductors GmbH; and Dr. Meyya Meyyappan, chief scientist for NASA.

An End User Forum is also planned, with panelists including Dr. Kenneth McGuire, principal scientist, Procter & Gamble; Antoine Ravise, R&D engineer, DECATHLON; and Scott Demarest, director, Colgate-Palmolive.

There are four concurrent tracks on Day 1. Two of the tracks are focused on Printed Electronics, covering areas such as Wearable Electronics, Bio-Electronics and Hardware, Smart Labels and Packaging and Photovoltaics. Day 1’s concurrent sessions include the co-located programs Graphene LIVE!, which will cover Supercapacitors and Graphene Opportunities in Supercapacitors; and OLEDs LIVE!, covering OLED vs. LED Lighting, OLED Displays and Scaling OLED Manufacturing.

Speakers from industry leaders such as Panasonic, GSI Technologies, Thin Film Electronics, T-Ink, PPG, DuPont and many others will offer their insights.

Exhibitors Bring Latest Advances

There will be a number of demonstrations as well, including Manufacturing Street, consisting of 11 companies demonstrating to end users and attendees how a fully functional PE system is designed and assembled. Demonstrating Street showcases PE products from more than 50 companies.

The NovaCentrix booth is laid out to emphasize each of the company’s product groups. The PulseForge 1200 R&D tool, which was launched last year at this event, is on-hand, and has been joined this year by the new PulseForge 1300.

“Sharing the same platform as the PulseForge 1200, the PulseForge 1300 has even higher peak-power delivery, while retaining the same pulse shaping capability that is built into all of our PulseForge tools,” Stan Farnsworth, vice president marketing, explained. “The PulseForge 1300 has the highest peak power available in an R&D tool on the market, which is needed for sintering or annealing materials such as inorganic semiconductors and ceramics.”

One of the leading topics in printed electronics continues to be system integration, and NovaCentrix has brought an example of a PulseForge 3200 production-series tool integrated with inkjet printing in a roll-to-roll configuration. Built with technologies from a number of collaborators, the integrated tool has a production speed in excess of 50 meters/minute.

“We have been using this tool internally for a couple of years now for manufacturing development in support of our clients, and as an ink and photonic curing development platform,” said Farnsworth. “Right now we are demonstrating the Metalon ICI-series copper oxide reduction ink: printing, drying and curing all in-line.” The ICI inks as well as the other Metalon conductive inks are also on display in the NovaCentrix booth.

NovaCentrix has an area of their exhibit area dedicated to showcasing their photonic curing simulation software, SimPulse. “Sometimes people ask why a photonic curing simulation is important,” said Farnsworth. “Experimentally determining the impact of 10-15 processing variables takes a lot of samples and a lot of time. Using SimPulse, our clients can run virtual tests in seconds, saving precious time and accelerating progress. The SimPulse interface matches the interface of the PulseForge tools, and is simple to use.”

XENON Corporation will feature live demonstrations of the world’s first large scale R2R pulsed light sintering system. The SINTERON 5000 will sinter functioning circuits on flexible substrates at high speed. Visitors to PE USA will be able to take away a working sample printed on the system.

“Roll to roll sintering is essential for current and potential PE applications, and we have achieved this milestone with the SINTERON 5000 system,” said Lou Panico, CEO of XENON. “This is the culmination of XENON’s 50 years of experience in pulsed light technology.”

Darren Bianchi, president of Nanogap USA, said that Nanogap is focusing on promoting its conductive nanomaterial dispersions to ink formulators.

“In particular, our silver nanoparticles dispersions can be used in inkjet and aerosol jet inks,” Bianchi said. “Benefits include stability and low temperature sintering. We also have a 50 nm silver dispersion at 70% weight. This has a shelf stability in excess of one year and at such a high concentration it gives formulators a lot of flexibility for use in multiple formulations. In the area of transparent conductive films we are featuring our silver nanofiber dispersions, which provide a cost effective solution for preparing films with low sheet resistance and good optical properties. I expect to initiate a number of a new product approval projects.”

Josh Goldberg, marketing specialist, Taiyo America, Inc., said that Taiyo will be featuring a range of products from conductive to dielectric to adhesive inks for the printed solar, battery, lighting and display markets.

“We are hoping to get more recognition for our products in these new markets,” Goldberg added. “Additionally, we want to foster contacts in our target industries as well as meet with raw material suppliers who can help us to develop new, cutting-edge products. As chairperson for the IPC D63 Printed Electronics Materials committee, I am hoping to meet with people interested in contributing to the guidelines that the IPC is trying to establish for dielectric and semiconductor materials.”