In this presentation you will have an insight of ALTANA and ELANTAS latest information, including the acquisition and integration of Von Roll; within this frame you will hear how the Printed Electronic product group, belonging to the ELANTAS division, can benefit by the competences of a strong technical specialty chemicals company like ALTANA.

Thin, light, flexible and robust are the key characteristics of printed electronics, which can be seamlessly integrated into a wide range of products. This enables new applications in a variety of industries, including automotive, consumer electronics, healthcare, printing/packaging and smart buildings, as well as its growing presence in the Internet of Things (IoT) - in short, "electronics everywhere". At the same time, there is a growing need for sustainable and circular electronics due to its quantities but also specifics of conventional electronics. Flexible and printed electronics enable more sustainable electronics by using new materials and processes, as well as through their lightweight nature.

The presentation will give an overview of current and latest activities of Fraunhofer IZM in the field of flexible, stretchable and conformable electronics. The focus is set on key technologies which are based on established printed circuit board, thermoforming and molding processes, which, through combination and adaption, lead to completely new, hybrid manufacturing concepts with high potential for innovative products and applications. Based upon current project results, challenging topics, such as additive vs. subtractive patterning, overall process compatibility and interconnection are picked out and discussed.

With the growing trend of surface functionalization, digitalization, and further need for data generation, printed electronics and, in particular, wearable technologies are rapidly entering different markets. For the realization of lightweight, thin, and above all, flexible solutions, the use of film-based systems is advantageous. Due to the specific requirements of printed electronics applications, special films need to be developed which are tailored to the needs of each application. One group of materials that can be tailored in a broad range and meet these requirements are films made from thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU). Especially for use as a substrate for printing sensor systems, TPU films show promising properties.

Two main advantages of Printed Electronics are flexibility and transparency.  Both features complement traditional electronic systems. At Kundisch we devote our production and development efforts to these advantages. In this presentation we will show the latest advances in transparent antennas and their production with high yields. The challenge of high conductivity, freedom of design and high transparency is mastered in these products. 

Additionally we show how to integrate ICs in stretchable products converting analog signals to digital as near to the signal source as possible. A possible game changer wearable electronics where contacting has been a real troublemaker in the past.

There is a new star on the printed electronics firmament: FLEXOO. What is FLEXOO? FLEXOO is a new company with a long history. If you want to lean more, my talk is the right place. I will explain where FLEXOO comes from, what our specialties are, and most importantly, what we are doing. This comprises our engineering and development capabilities, our production knowhow, and the advantages of our special equipment. All this explains our infinite possibilities.

Finally, I will provide several case studies with our industry customers and explain the connection between FLEXOO and the Mars. Believe it or not, NASA is involved. And no, I will not talk about solderable copper ink.

Functional inks applied on flexible substrates is one key application in the scope of “Printed Electronics”. Creating electronics may require mounting of functional components such as LEDs, sensors, or ICs. PET is very often used as such a flexible substrate making low temperature processes mandatory.

To keep the functionality and the flexibility of the printed and mounted substrate, additional stabilization of the components might become necessary. The presentation shall provide some ideas and solutions how to cope with these challenges.

Witte Technology has used printed electronics to achieve a milestone in the digitalisation of care and successfully put a sensor for digital incontinence management into series production.

This sensor can reliably monitor the urine fill level and .

Monitoring the urine fill level of the incontinence products- Movement monitoring- Pressure ulcer prevention- fall detection- Zone management for dementia patients. In addition to the reliable performance of the sensors, a key challenge in the development of this medical product was the price and scalability of the solution. Printed electronics offer clear advantages here compared to conventional electronic component designs

The demand for printed electronics, especially sensors, is constantly growing over the last few years. Standard printing techniques like screen or inkjet printing are widely used with great success. Most of the substrates are two dimensional like foils printed in a either roll to roll or sheet to sheet process.

Often these substrates have to be connected with the actual surface where the function is needed
for instance via an extra gluing or laminating process. In contrast, the binder innovation and technology center is using an alternative approach. For three dimensional or structured substrates, pad printing is used. The function is directly printed on the substrate without any additional process. During the printing process, the paste is transferred from a printing form (cliché) via a silicon pad directly on the substrate. This process is well established for high volume production in marketing or graphic printing.

In order to achieve a reproducible and stable functional layer special needs of the printing pastes in terms of viscosity and homogenous preparation are required. Typical line widths are 80 - 100 µm and a layer thickness of 8-15 µm. Applications range from force and touch sensors as well as heating devices or bioelectrodes.

Although not intended for this printing technique binder uses different ELANTAS printing pastes for this purpose with great success since many years.

New applications in the field of printed electronics require higher demands on the functional pastes used and pose new challenges for further development. In this presentation, the current topics in research and development at ELANTAS Europe GmbH will be presented.

One focus will be on the development of paste combinations for printing fine structures (including multilayer structures) on a wide variety of substrates. The future reduction of silver with the possible use of copper also has an influence here. On the other hand, the demands on the insulators used as a migration barrier are increasing. Accordingly, part of the development is the further optimization of the screen-printable insulators used, also with regard to transferring methods from conventional electronics to printed electronics.

to be confirmed