Analysts

Challenges and Risks defined by our analyst

While there are already some products in the market-place and a whole range of applications in development, the carbon nanotube market has been constrained by three main issues:
1. A lack of commercially-available material of consistently high quality.
2. Cost - until recently single-wall carbon nanotubes were selling for US$ 400/g which is clearly some way from commercial viability as a bulk material.
3. Successfully expressing the basic properties of the raw material in the end application - the incredibly small scale of the material poses some interesting challenges for advanced material and coatings science.

Competing in the high-stakes patent game requires not only winning and defending patents, but also using them as bargaining chips to cross-license other proprietary technologies. Intellectual property is one of the biggest expenses for fledgling start-ups, and nanotech industry insiders predict that long and costly patent litigation battles could inflict mortal wounds. But the transaction costs of filing for and defending patents are enormous. Competing in the high-stakes patent game requires not only winning and defending patents, but also using them as bargaining chips to cross-license other proprietary technologies. Intellectual property is one of the biggest expenses for fledgling start-ups, and nanotech industry insiders predict that long and costly patent litigation battles could inflict mortal wounds.