Strategic Elements Ltd (ASX:SOR) has received Federal Government financial support for its joint CSIRO and Nanocube Memory Ink Project.
Grant funding has been awarded to trial methods of optimising the levels of organic material within a Memory Ink for industrial-scale processes.
Minimising the carbon content within a Memory Ink potentially enhances larger-scale manufacturing capability by reducing the number of steps in the fabrication process.
Grant awarded to joint team
The grant has been awarded to the Nanomaterials and Devices Team of CSIRO Manufacturing based in Melbourne and Strategic’s 100%-owned Australian Advanced Materials (AAM).
Charles Murphy, managing director, said: “Being awarded grant funding reflects the creditability of the joint CSIRO Innovation Connections Project.
“Recent participation in PrintoCent Industry Cluster meetings in Finland with some of the world’s leading printed electronics companies has continued to enable networking and expose the team to cutting-edge developments.
Overseas partner options
“Options for development of Memory Ink with overseas partners have also been increased and significant potential cost reduced through an overseas finding enabling access to the 43% cash rebate on overseas work.”
The grant has enabled the placement of a CSIRO researcher to work collaboratively with AAM on an Innovation Connections project to develop and implement a new idea with commercial potential.
CSIRO and AAM recently demonstrated that it was possible to scale up the synthesis batch of Nanocubes to a litre scale.
This eliminated an existing bottleneck present in the previous syntheses where 15-millilitre autoclaves limited the amount of Nanocubes that could be synthesised at the University of New South Wales.
Simplifying manufacturing process
This work aims to simplify the potential manufacturing process by eliminating certain steps in post-print layer deposition processing.
CSIRO staff will also provide consultation on a program of work being conducted at the University of New South Wales to further enhance the performance of the Memory Ink.
The $100,000 project will be co-funded by the Federal Government and Strategic Elements until April 2018.
Strategic is unaware of any commercially available memory ink with characteristics of transparency, flexibility and potential for larger memory capacity.
Membership of cluster
AAM views membership of PrintoCent Cluster as an important gateway for its technology.
As such, the company attended a recent industry seminar in Finland organised by the cluster and attended by leading industrial companies.
Strategic also continues to invest significant time into the identification and assessment of a project acquisition for 100%-owned Stealth Technologies Pty Ltd.
Due diligence has been conducted on deals in the Artificial Intelligence and IOT sectors, however, the company is investigating opportunities across a number of emerging sectors.
Cash back on overseas R&D
AAM recently received an ‘overseas finding’ from the Australian government that enables eligible research and development to be provided with a 43% rebate.
More than $840,000 in cash is expected to be received by the company in March 2018.
Murphy said: “Potential for large-scale uplift for shareholders is certainly top of mind.
“The company also expects to increase its cash position by $840,000 without shareholder dilution through the successful application of the R&D rebate which in combination with ongoing low corporate overheads and existing funds provides a strong platform.”