Solterra's exclusive agreements & competitive advantages
(I am only taking relevant parts from the press releases to make my points)
University of Arizona enters into exclusive worldwide licensing agreement for Solterra Renewable Technologies to fabricate its patented light-emitting diodes or LED screen-printing technology.
Hague/Solterra today announced an exclusive worldwide licensing agreement with the University of Arizona for the patented, intellectual property covering screen-printing techniques for the fabrication of organic light emitting diodes.
The University of Arizona pioneering technology makes significant improvements over prior art. Organic LED / OLED based displays now have the potential to be manufactured using very high volume, low cost roll-to-roll print processing on inexpensive substrates.
Note: This is for a roll-to-roll screen printing press - not on glass or silicon. This is non-vacuum process. That's two major advances and time and cost-cutting processes in one agreement.
From the same PR:
Organic light emitting diodes, known generally as LEDs, are an essential component of displays, batteries, sensors, conductors and computer memory.
Solterra's CEO Stephen Squires explained that there are essential similarities between the screen-printing techniques to fabricate LEDs and the screen printing technology that Solterra is currently optimizing to print quantum dots to make thin-film solar cells.
Using this licensing agreement to fabricate LEDs using screen printing techniques will greatly reduce the costs of LEDs, Squires explained. The high cost of producing LEDs has limited its uses; and therefore a dramatic cost reduction will greatly expand LED use, he added.
"There are useful similarities in the underlying design and manufacturing technology for quantum dot solar cells and other printed electronics applications such as batteries, sensors, conductors, lighting, logic and memory," he said.
Squires noted LED/OLED displays will likely emerge as the second most significant market for printed electronics.
"When you can leverage a single enabling technology, such as our semiconductor quantum dots, to enter two or more different, but massive, markets without straying from your core competencies, the business opportunity is very compelling," he said.
Note: This is a second major industry for Solterra. If it were the only one, it would still make a compelling case for investing in Solterra.
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Solterra Concludes Worldwide Exclusive License with Rice University.
The Rice process produces same-sized particles, in which more than 90 percent are tetrapods; previously even in the best recipe less than 50 percent of the prepared particles were tetrapods. Furthermore, the Rice process uses much cheaper raw materials and fewer purification steps reducing the production cost by 80% or more. A positively charged molecule called cetyltrimethylammonium bromide provides this drastic improvement in tetrapod manufacture. This compound, found in some shampoos, also happens to be 100 times cheaper than alkylphosphonic acids and is far safer, further simplifying the manufacturing process.
Note: Lowest cost Quantum Dot; highest purity/quality batch of quantum dot; lowest cost of materials; simpler manufacturing process with less steps.
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Hague Corp. Subsidiary Solterra Renewable Technologies Signs Memorandum Of Understanding With Access2Flow To Develop Revolutionary, Cost-Effective Mass Production Of Quantum Dots
TEMPE, Ariz., Aug 12, 2009 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- Hague Corp.'s , wholly owned subsidiary Solterra Renewable Technologies, Inc., has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with The Netherlands-based Access2Flow Holdings BV to develop a low-cost continuous process for mass producing quantum dots that will revolutionize the economics of quantum dot and solar cell production.
Under the terms of the MOU, Access2Flow, a joint venture of FutureChemistry Holding BV and Flowid BV, will adapt its highly regarded, proven chemical flow technology to create a machine that will produce quantum dots in multi-kilogram quantities per day versus current technology that only produces grams per day.
CEO Stephen Squires of Solterra Technologies said, "Bringing these two disruptive technologies together changes the world of quantum dot production and puts Solterra in the lead. It enables Solterra to escalate present production from mere grams per day to a process that is capable of producing quantum dots 24 hours per day, 7 days a week."
Squires said that Access2Flow has determined that Solterra's quantum dot synthesis technology is uniquely suited for this transition from batch processing to a continuous flow process. Access2Flow's pioneering work in continuous flow chemistry is in the forefront of the "lab to factory" concept, process optimization and tight quality control that is required for implementation of commercial-scale production of quantum dots.
Solterra will own all intellectual property resulting from the optimization efforts, in line with Solterra's long-term business objective to broaden its technology offerings in quantum dot-based products and advanced materials, he added.
A key barrier in commercial development of quantum dot technologies has been price. Quantum dots can cost from $3,000 to $10,000 per gram, restricting their use to highly specialized applications, according to Nature Magazine June 2009 "Quantum Dots Go Large."
Squires also noted that low-cost materials and this advanced continuous flow chemistry provide a path to high quality affordable quantum dots to enable rapid commercialization of solar cells, flexible displays, flash memory devices and LED lighting.
Squires said that Solterra is planning to leapfrog solar cell production capacity that remains fairly limited and expensive, by implementation of non silicon based high-throughput printing techniques for its quantum dot solar cells to eventually exceed gigawatt-scale yearly production.
He explained that availability of raw material input for competing silicon-based solar cells has been an issue in recent years, and the amount of silicon wafers necessary for even 100 megawatts is quite substantial.
To put everything in perspective, Squires explained, "When running 24/7, our projections show that the continuous quantum dot synthesis will not only supply our needs for hundreds, if not thousands, of megawatts in solar cell production, but will also provide the capacity to expand on our plans to bring affordable quantum dots to market for non-solar uses."
He continued, "Quantum dots are showing incredible potential in so many different and exciting product applications. Yet, due to production limitations, prices have been high, and yearly consumption is easily measured in kilograms. Just like our plans for dramatic increases in solar cell production, we believe that this breakthrough with Access2Flow will help us to attain daily and weekly sales amounts that used to take an entire year to achieve."
Note: Solterra will produce multi-kilograms of quantum dots as opposed to grams/day; Solterra's goal is not some big 20-megawatt plant, but gigawatts in yearly production; Solterra will own all intellectual property resulting from the optimization efforts (quantum dot mass-production techniques), and excellent availability of basic materials supply
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Exclusive Product: CdSe Quantum Dot
Exclusive Quantum Dot Manufacturing Process
Exclusive Screen Printing on Roll to Roll Non-Vacuum Press
Advantages:
lower cost materials,
simpler process to make quantum dots,
higher purity/quality quantum dot,
higher efficiency (potential)quantum dot,
mass production method for quantum dots,
simpler process to make sheets of OLED and LEDs,
potential to adapt the printing process to solar panel printing.
