Arkema, CEA and Arjowiggins Creative Papers Promote Collaborative PE Innovation

Arkema, CEA and Arjowiggins Creative Papers have set up the first European initiative to promote collaborative innovation in the field of printed electronics.

Arkema offers a range of materials specifically for printed electronics, in particular through its subsidiary Piezotech. This unique range of electroactive inks provides solutions to the various requirements of the actuators and sensors industry. Meanwhile, Arjowiggins Creative Papers has developed a unique paper substrate technology for organic electronics. CEA provides support with its design tools, as well as its PICTIC1 technological research and prototyping platform to validate and develop large area printing technologies in low-cost and flexible electronics.

The Open Innovation for Sensors and Actuators (OIS&A) initiative is underpinned by this unique partnership that pools all three players together in substrate, materials, and integration and design technologies, with a view to offering a comprehensive ecosystem to end-users eager to demonstrate new applications and develop new products in printed electronics. Original components and systems can be designed and demonstrated quickly by making full use of the partners’ infrastructure and know-how and by sharing R&D costs.

”Arkema develops high added value high performance materials, and our collaboration with CEA in the field of printed organic electronics addresses this challenge” said Ian Cayrefourq, emerging technologies director at Arkema. “We are launching this initiative with CEA and Arjowiggins Creative Papers in order to initially expand the scope of applications of our piezoelectric, pyroelectric and electroactive PVDF-based polymer materials developed by our subsidiary Piezotech.”

“Printed electronics is an emerging sector in breakthrough applications and evolving market structures, which is both an asset and a challenge,” said Florence Lambert, director of Institut Liten at CEA. “The PICTIC platform represents a genuine competitive asset for industrialists who want to expand in the highly dynamic printed electronics sector. This first class infrastructure in Europe is made available to industrialists as part of fully modular collaboration research contracts. Indeed the aim of this initiative is to help bring processes to fruition and facilitate their switch to industrial scale, demonstrate new applications, and speed up product development.”

“We believed that the PowerCoat paper substrate was particularly suited to printed electronics,” addded Gaël Depres, exploratory and partnership manager at Arjowiggins Creative Papers. “Thanks to our research collaboration with CEA, we were able to validate the compatibility of this substrate with printed electronics processes, a vital step for the development of this innovative product. Our objective is for PowerCoat to become a benchmark substrate for paper-based printed electronics.”