Six year old start-up Plastic Logic aims to go head-to-head with major consumer electronics firms such as Philips by starting the manufacture of flexible active matrix displays for e-book products early next year.
The company, which spun out of Cavendish Laboratories in 2000, has secured equity funding of $100m to help fund the building of a production facility in Dresden.
According to Simon Jones Plastic Logic’s v-p of product development, it will be the first factory to manufacture plastic electronics on a commercial scale.
“This represents the first serious money for the commercialisation of plastic electronics which we believe will have a major impact on consumer electronics,” Jones told EW.
The facility will produce flexible active-matrix display modules based on the firm’s proprietary plastic transistor technology which replaces silicon transistors in traditiional active matrix LCDs.
The result said Jones is a “paper-like display which is thin, light and robust and closer to paper than any other technology”.
To fund this comprehensive commercialization program, Plastic Logic has completed a first closing of $100m of equity finance led by Oak Investment Partners and Tudor Investment Corporation.
Hermann Hauser, director of existing investor Amadeus commented: “Having backed Plastic Logic from day one, I am delighted that the first full commercialisation of plastic electronics is now firmly in our sights. With this investment we are not only scaling up a great company - we are also creating a new electronics industry that will become a significant addition to silicon.”
Existing investors Amadeus, which led the seed financing of Plastic Logic, Intel Capital, Bank of America, BASF Venture Capital, Quest for Growth and Merifin Capital also participated.
“This investment is a perfect fit with Oak’s vision of future media interaction through handheld devices,” said Rob Broggi, v-p and director of technology, media and telecoms equity research at Tudor.
“It meets our objective to find and participate in the most exciting investment opportunities globally, particularly in mobile and nanotechnology sectors,” said Broggi.
The facility will produce display modules for portable electronic reader devices – a product category that is predicted to grow to 41.6 million units in 2010. It will have an initial capacity of more than a million display modules per year and production will start in 2008.