According to a new report titled ‘Nanometals in Electronics and Energy Markets – 2012 and Beyond’ from NanoMarkets, the market for nanostructures, nanoinks and pastes, and nanoparticles will be worth $2 billion by the fiscal year 2017.
The report provides forecast data for the nanomaterials based on applications such as chemical catalysts, sensors, energy storage, solar panels, smart windows, organic and printed electronics, computer memories and optical storage, consumer appliances and printed circuit boards. The report also includes forecast data by material types such as palladium, platinum, copper, gold, silver and much more.
Efforts have been taken by the nanometals business to widen its application markets other than the research and development field. However, nanometals have not been well accepted as substitutes for conventional conductive inks. Hence, suppliers of nanometals will have to change their strategy towards novel applications, including catalysts for the chemical and energy industries, and optical storage disks. According to the report, if nanometal companies follow this strategy, nearly 93% of the nanometal sales will be generated from today’s barely existing markets by 2017.
At present, nanostructures, nanoparticles, pastes and silver inks account for nearly 85% of the total revenues of the nanometals business. However, the report predicts that this share will be reduced to 54% by 2017 and the anticipated gainers will be gold, palladium and platinum. Palladium and platinum nanomaterials will find a niche market, as the demand for superior performance materials from the producers of chemical catalysts and sensors. Gold nanomaterials will find use in various applications such as in new data storage forms.
Source: http://nanomarkets.net