外文翻譯--印刷電子油墨的市場增長（英文）

1、March/April 2014 www.inkworldmagazine.com 61BY DAVID SAVASTANOEDITORDSAVASTANO@RODMANMEDIA.COMThe Growing Market for Conductive InksConductive ink manufacturers are seeing more flexible and printed electronics system

2、s reach pilot production and manufacturing stages.Printed electronics (PE) continues to show growth on a number of fronts. As some applications move from the lab to pilot production and manufacturing, other com-panies

3、 are beginning to think about what flexible and print- ed electronics can do for their products.“An increasing number of clients are approaching us, with new interest in printed elec- tronics,” said Stan Farnsworth, v

4、ice president of marketing at NovaCentrix. “Technologies have advanced to the point that in most cases off-the-shelf solu- tions are now available, allow- ing our clients to move through their product development o

5、ften-times more quickly than they anticipated.”“The market is continuing to grow, and we are working on more opportunities,” said Allen Reid, commercial director for NANOGAP .“The growth opportunities in the flexible

6、 and printed elec- tronics markets are clearly apparent,” said Roy Bjorlin, global commercial director, Electronic Materials, Sun Chemical. “A significant amount of our strategic focus at Sun Chemical is in electronic

7、 packages or smart packages. Since our alliance with T+ink, we have been exposed to many more applica- tions where advanced materials, including conductive inks, are growing.”Terry Kaiserman, T+ink co-founder and chief

8、 technical of-ficer, said that flexible printed electronics is in a considerable growth surge.“This surge is attested to by our customer requirements and new inquiries,” said Kaiserman. “The future for flexible conduct

9、ive compounds and materials will be the norm for in- dustries that require bendable or pliant attributes to their final products.”“The Toyo Ink Group has seen a growing trend in the use of screenprinting to form elec- t

10、rodes of 100 um or less, pri- marily for touch panels,” said Kody Osato, marketing manager, Advanced Materials Division at Toyo Ink International Corp. “This has resulted in the wid- er application of Toyo Ink’s Rex

11、alpha series of conductive silver paste products.” Matt Ganslaw, vice president of sales for Creative Materials, said that his company special- izes in custom formulations for a wide variety of industries.“Our conduct

12、ive inks are developed for specific custom- ers, primarily for EMI shield- ing, medical electrodes, busbars for touch screens, resistor inks for flexible heaters, security and smart card industry, screen, flexo and grav

13、ure solar grid inks and adhesives, and touch screens,” Ganslaw said. “Printed mem- ory is also a growing market for us.”“We remain excited about and committed to the printed electronics industry because we continue to s

14、ee new oppor- tunities where printed electronics - and the materials used to create them - can create value across several industries and value chains,” said Steven Willoughby, marketing man- ager for DuPont Microcircu

15、it Materials. “Many of these new PROCID test electrode structure printed on flexible low cost PET substrate for a medical diagnostics application. (Photo courtesy of Intrinsiq Materials Ltd.)61-64 Conductive Inks 0314.

16、indd 61 3/12/14 11:19 AMMarch/April 2014 www.inkworldmagazine.com 63Conductive Inksgood news is that more PE products are reaching pilot produc- tion and manufacturing.“We are certainly seeing more printed electron

17、ics applica-tions reaching the pilot production and manufacturing stages,” said Bjorlin. “In particular, we are seeing the advanced designs moving towards production at a faster rate. This includes ap- plications for n

18、ano silver and inkjet.”“We are supplying nanofiber and nanoparticle dispersions, which are both being used at pilot production and manufac- turing stages,” Reid said.Once more PE products like temperature sensors reach t

19、he market, it is likely other companies will see the advantages and will follow.“Intrinsiq is at or near pilot production stage with several clients,” Clark said. “As the first application goes commercial, we anticipat

20、e a domino effect.”“As always, there is a continuum, and various applica-tions are at various stages in their life cycles” said Willoughby. “However the general trend we see is that more applications are moving toward

21、commercialization. We continue to see the opportunity to speed adoption through increased collaboration along the supply chain.” “It has been a challenging process with a lot of auxiliary is-sues which needed to be add

22、ressed. However, the applications are now proceeding to pilot and small production volumes,” Lindquist said.“We have seen an increase in cases where transparent conduc-tive films are produced by the wet-coating process

23、,” Osato said. Kaiserman said that there is a tremendous amount of re-search stage and development stage projects within T+ink, and quite a few have emerged as manufacturing orders.“Because T+ink has been in business in

24、 its different forms for so many years, we have mature and tested formulations that allow most every customer to design a project with existing chemical and engineering know-how,” Kaiserman added.“For some time, the pu

25、blic discussion of printed electron-ics has been oriented to product and device performance,” Farnsworth said. “Increasingly though, our clients include peo- ple with an operations focus in their job description, with a

26、 focus on topics like cost of consumables, product stability and process sensitivity. These customers require products that get the right results reliably and consistently. As more PE compa- nies work with clients in

27、these stages of product use, we’ll see an evolution in the language used to describe the products.”Important Advances In Conductive Materials Conductive inks have come a long way in recent years, as suppliers work on

28、 meeting the needs of end users. There is still room for improvement, particularly as applications reach production.“Speed and process simplifications are the key focus areas sought by flexible and printed electronics

29、manufacturers,” said Bjorlin. “Sun Chemical’s range of electronic materials supports both additive and subtractive processes, in addition to aerosol dispensing and inkjet, gravure and offset printing.”“For nanofibers a

30、nd transparent conductive films, the drive is to keep improving optical properties, in particular to reduce haze,” Reid said. “For successful commercialization of nanopar- ticle based inks, low temperature sintering is

31、key.”Farnsworth and Clark said that conductivity, adhesion and cost are key attributes end users are seeking.“Clients are still seeking products that maximize perfor-mance such as conductivity and substrate adhesion, whi

32、le minimizing costs,” Farnsworth said. “Progress with end-use ap- plications moving to commercialization is being made because the level of offerings to meet these requirements is improving.”“The key requirement is del

33、ivering high performance, in terms of conductivity and adhesion to substrate, etc. reliably and repeatedly at low cost,” Clark said. “Depending on the de- mands of the particular application, this tends to require opti-

34、 mization and sometimes reformulation on a case-by-case basis.”“Cost versus performance is always the equation,” Kaiserman said. “On the material side, lower cost conductors are critical for those of us who want PE to b

35、ecome ubiquitous. On the processing side, lower temperature cure and/or faster cure sys- tems, along with improved stability, are necessary to increase performance and productivity for printers.”Willoughby reported tha

36、t DuPont is seeing a few trends from manufacturers.” “These include the ability to function with new and novel application technologies, getting the right electrical and sig- nal performance for each specific application

37、 and the desire to reduce the dependence on precious metals such as silver,” Willoughby added.Ganslaw noted that increasing conductivity impacts cost. “Printed electronics manufacturers are seeking a number of advances

38、, such as printing finer features for busbars, touch screens and printed memory, as thinner features means less silver being used,” Ganslaw said. “There is also more tailor- ing to the conductivity needs for specific a

39、reas to reduce cost. Customers are also looking for environmental aging and reli- ability testing, and we have brought in new testing equipment to meet their needs.” “There have been advancements in processing efficie

40、ncy in which the conductive material can be applied only to a re- quired area,” Osato said. “In addition, screen printing as the application method has become simplified and easier to use.”“Most of the advancements are

41、focused on obtaining adhe-sion and low resistance levels on substrates which are sensi- tive to higher temperatures,” Lindquist said. “In addition to the required electrical and physical properties, there is also a need

42、 to make connections to the conductive inks, which can be dif- ficult on temperature sensitive substrates. Ink flexibility is an- other desirable characteristic which would expand the reach of additive manufacturing be