Fat profits from thin-film electronics

According to a new report from NanoMarkets, emerging thin-film electronics applications will generate $15.5 billion in revenue in the year 2011.

The report, "The New Thin-Film Electronics" examines how advances in materials and production modalities are enabling new growth opportunities in the semiconductor business.

By 2011, NanoMarkets expects that display applications using thin-film electronics (excluding LCD displays) will reach $7.3 billion. However, over the next two years the firm believes that the market will also see significant new business opportunities emerge from other applications of thin-film electronics such as photovoltaics, batteries, sensors, information storage and lighting.

These new developments will involve some of the best known names in the electronics industry -- firms such as Sanyo, Sharp and Seagate -- as well as start-ups such as Konarka and Innovalight.

While established thin-film technology has had an important role in the electronics industry for many years, "the new thin-film electronics" as termed by NanoMarkets, is being enabled by a rush of new materials such as conductive polymers, high-k and low-k materials, silicon inks and carbon nanotube pastes.