VCs highlight interest in Printed Electronics

 

Abdul Guefor of Intel Capital gave a fascinating angle from this part of Intel at the IDTechEx Printed Electronics Europe conference. Intel claims to be the world's most successful high volume manufacturer - something of a riposte to those lecturers talking about China and the rest of East Asia taking over all high volume manufacture for the world. Intel Capital is the world's largest venture capital company and its investments have generated billions of dollars of cash for its parent: they are already leveraging the parent's technology.

 

Intel is not developing printed electronics despite having the view that it is one of several technologies that can greatly impact the existing silicon platform priorities. Can printed electronics provide biotechnology chips, sensor inputs and more? Intel is addressing this with a large number of strategic investments, the latest being Plastic Logic.

 

Intel provides vital technical and business assistance to its investments and Plastic Logic has already benefited.

 

 

Hermann Hauser drew on his stellar performance in starting and funding businesses in the Cambridge area to compare venture capital in the US, UK and the rest of Europe. He concluded that there has never been a shortage of technology. There were too few European startups being funded compared to the US but this is no longer true. There is still an underfunding of startups in amount invested per venture and there are too few second stage fundings approved but the gap is closing. He gave some history of the inventions and Nobel prizes in Cambridge (more than all countries other than the US and UK). He proudly claimed that, with so many printed electronics startups in the area, it is "Plastic Valley" - a modern replacement for yesterday's "Silicon Valley" on the other side of the Atlantic!

 

Read our 13 page analysis of the progress discussed at Printed Electronics Europe in the May issue of Smart Labels Analyst  - you can purchase the single issue with IDTechEx credits  or buy a years subscription.

 

Further information can be found on IDTechEx and Printed Electronics at www.printelec.com . The next Printed Electronics conference will take place in Phoenix, USA on 5/6 December, 2006.