3D Printed multilayer circuit boards using nanomaterial inks
Nano Dimension (NASDAQ, TASE: NNDM) is focused on the research and development of advanced 3D printed electronics, including a 3D printer for multilayer printed circuit boards, and the development of nanotechnology-based conductive and dielectric inks, which are complementary products for 3D printers.
Nextbigfuture interviewed Amit Dror, CEO and cofounder of Nano Dimension. Amit is a project leader with extensive experience in company and account management.
Nano Dimension's novel and proprietary technologies enable the use of conductive and dielectric inks for ultra-rapid prototyping of complex, high-performance multilayer circuit boards. The company's PCB 3D printer is the result of combining advanced breakthroughs in inkjet technology, 3D printing and nanotechnology.
Nano Dimension's DragonFly 2020 3D printer is a highly accurate and versatile inkjet deposition and curing system for printing professional multilayer circuit boards. The DragonFly 2020 3D Printer represents an evolution unlike anything the industry has seen before. The innovative hardware, dedicated nano-inks and novel software offers virtually limitless design flexibility to a wide range of research and development, prototyping and custom manufacturing projects. Our highly conductive silver nano inks for electronics printing are also available separately.
The DragonFly 2020 3D Printer offers the flexibility to print an entire board or just part of a circuit. You can develop the RF and digital sections of the board in parallel, test and iterate on the fly.
It is about $200,000 per printer.
It prints at 10 to 100 microns. They could go to higher resolution but there is a resolution throughput tradeoff.
The 3d printing of electronics allow for a few hours to get a completed board.
It removes the need to use service bureaus or to send work to China or Taiwan. Domestic service bureaus have technical limitations and still require several days to turn around an order.
Factory turnaround times can be 3 to 6 weeks and requires scheduling with the international factory.
Factories currently cost $10 to 15 million.
Close-up of a multilayer PCB printed by the DragonFly 2020 3D Printer
Dragonfly 2020 3d printer
Bioprinting partners
Nano Dimensions is partner will Accelta on bioprinting. Bioprinting companies are currently now using the best inkjet technology.
Nano Dimensions is licensing their 20 patents and technology for bioprinting. They are also providing their expertise to enable faster and better tissue printing.
Why are massive inkjet arrays not mainstream ?
Several years ago there was a lot of hype that we would have low cost, mainstream inkjet arrays to print whole pages at rapid speed. Nextbigfuture asked Amit at Nano Dimensions why this only happened in a limited way for very expensive printers and not the promised sub $500 printers.
Amit indicated it was a quality control issue. Having so many printheads could not keep the level of 99.999" quality and reliability.
They are working on optical supervision of the system and gradually increasing printheads.
Future of building electronics into the frame of wearables
Another area for the future is to take cutouts of the circuits boards they are printing and building electronics into say the frames of wearable glasses and other gadgets and technology. This will enable lighter and better equipment.
