Demise Of Chip Factories Predicted By Nanotechnology Expert - New Technology

Douglas Mulhall, author of Our Molecular Future, has given a speech entitled "How Nanotechnology is Transforming Ottawa’s IT Horizon" and outlined how nanotechnology could destroy the computer chip manufacturing industry as we know it.

He told the audience, "We now see hundreds of companies around the world manufacturing products by printing them three dimensionally. It looks like this technology will become as common as bubble-jet printing technology is now." He pointed out that bubble jet printing already works on the scale of billionths of a metre and computer chips will be able to be printed by $75 000 to $750 000 table top boxes rather $4-billion factories.

These boxes are part of the rapid prototyping industry and are already used to some programmable chips, prototype parts and surgical models.

Posted 24^th March 2004