Calderdale Meet the Buyer

More information about the Meet the Buyer event we are running on 21st November 2012.


http://www.businessgrowthcalderdale.co.uk/announcements/97/Connecting-Manufacturingl

Flexible Printed Electronics

I have wittered on for the past couple of years about the exciting prospect of flexible printed electronics as a result of working for PETEC, part of CPI in the North East of England.  What this basically means is that surfaces all around us can become video displays or solar cells.
The BBC technology programme Click has just run a section on this as developed by Plastic Logic as part of their Paperless special.  You can see it here. on iplayer.  It might not be up for long, and might not be accessible outside the UK.  The relevant bit starts about 9:32 into the programme.

Sustainable Packaging - 10th May 2012

I have the pleasure of speaking at a Seminar on Packaging Sustainability at the IOM3 in Grantham on Thursday 10th May 2012. 
I started out as a physicist, then slid over to a PhD in Polymer Physics, and onto work for ICI on Polyethylene, Polypropylene, PET and PEN.  During that time I increasingly appreciated the contribution that polymers made to our world, and how much packaging adds to it too.  Packaging, particularly plastic packaging, is seen as a modern scurge to be eliminated.  The good it does in protecting in the value of materials in transit, particularly food, is never mentioned.  The potential for further value from the materials through reuse, recycling or energy extraction is rarely mentioned for anything but glass (and don't get me started on why PP and PET are better than glass).

It is a key, and emotive issue.  But to get real sustainable environmental improvement we need to focus on the real issues, and not just the emotive ones.  The percentage of oil used to make plastics is about 7% last time I checked - of which packaging is only a part.  We burn the rest for heat and in cars.  Of course you can use plastics, and then burn them for heat.  The real issue is use of oil in heating and transport.

Of course with all packaging we should also be aiming to reduce the use (or weight), increase reuse and recycling - and this is not just environmental sense, it is good business sense.  There is no law that says that sustainable packaging has to be a cost to a business when compared to standard packaging, though suppliers may try to convince you to pay a sustainability premium
Anyway, that will be the general tone of my presentation - I'll put it up here when it is finished.

Your Flat screen is fat

I recently attended an event organised by Chemicals NorthWest on Printable electronics. You may not have heard much about this emerging technology, but it is going to change a lot of the world around us. The sector covers quite a broad range of activities, but the key factor is (as you might expect) electronic components that can be printed on surfaces in a similar way to printing newspapers on paper. Or perhaps slightly closer, printed wallpaper.
There are a myriad of related issues and concepts, such as organic polymer batteries, light sources and the like, but essentially when this technology comes through we can expect to have our televisions as wallpaper in our living rooms – or potentially on the windows. And our energy produced by thin films of photocells on our roof or any other surface (flat or not)

One of the nice things about this is that it is an area where British companies are in with a good chance of establishing a strong position. This is a disruptive technology, so all the companies trying to develop it are pretty much starting from the same position. Ultimately the devices might be assembled in the far east, which is a shame for UK manufacturing, but the real money could be in the design and manufacture of raw materials and components, and the use of design of the end product. In these areas UK businesses are well placed.
Although I was aware of the technology, I was not aware of how advanced it is until this conference. We were shown a Sony OLED TV – which had better colours than most HD TVs, and was at most half the thickness of an IPod. And this dates from about 3 years ago.
The world will look more like Minority Reports than many of us expected, and it will be with us far sooner than I expected. This is expected to be a market worth hundreds of Billions by the end of the decade.
Of course, at the moment it is all quite staggeringly expensive – but that can change over time. And with it will come an even more futuristic world than we can imagine. Of course, when it does arrive we will take it for granted in about six months.
The opportunities for British business are significant. Dr. Chris Drew of Soris compared the state of this industry to that of pharmaceuticals in the 1950s – fast paced, very high specifications, very technical, great potential, still largely undeveloped. The UK was able to take advantage of that – let’s hope we can do the same again.

NPD - slides

As promised.

NPD - a personal case study

On Tuesday night I gave a personal case study on New Product Development at the SME Network at Bradford School of Management. Apologies for the delay in putting the slides up.

I am experimenting with using docstoc.com for hosting these files, so please forgive any unusual formatting. You should be able to access a PDF file by clicking here, or on the title. And just to be sure I shall attach the slides as Jpegs as well.

NPD case study presentation -

Evening Master Class – New Product Development – 9th February 2010

I shall be speaking at the Bradford University School of Management SME network event on Tuesday 9th February 2010. The event is supported by a range of funds, and so is free to attend.

Dr Rana Tessabehji will be presenting before me, with an interesting talk entitled : Killer Ideas, developing new products and services. I will then be talking through a case study from my days in the chemical industry

The event kicks off at 5pm for coffee, with presentations from 5:30 to 7:15pm, followed by networking. Directions to the venue can be found by clicking here.

We hope to follow this event with a full day event later in February or March 2010.