Graphene and the innovation gap

This week some rather pessimistic articles on graphene’s commercial potential appeared in the UK press. On Tuesday, Aditya Chakrabortty commented in the Guardian on “How UK wonder substance graphene can’t and won’t benefit UK“, highlighting some pretty poor statistics when it comes to the innovation in graphene here in the UK, where Andrei Geim and Kostya Novoselov carried out their pioneering research:

Our record with graphene has been similarly dismal. Consultants calculate that China has taken out more than 2,200 patents on the material; the US more than 1,700; South Korea is closing in on 1,200. And the country that discovered it? Just over 50.

One of the problems, Geim is quoted in the article, is that there isn’t industrial sponsorship for his research:

Here is one of the world’s great scientists, pointing out that British businesses are either incapable or unwilling to use his inventions. The effect is rather like James Watt complaining that he can’t find any takers for his new steam engine.

This negative picture from a research perspective has been contrasted from the industrial side with a commentary by Jonathan Ely in the Financial Times this Saturday, saying there is too much investment into graphene: “The growing graphene investment bubble” (reading this link requires free registration at the FT). For Ely it seems the problem is not the industrial side – several companies now are on the market aiming to commercialize graphene – but that there is just nothing interesting about graphene (even though the Guardian continues to call it a ‘wonder’ material):

Graphene has been around since 2004, and many patents connected with it have been filed around the world (the Koreans are especially interested). Bill Gates has suggested it be used to make indestructible condoms to prevent the spread of disease in the developing world. But so far there are no widespread commercial uses for it.

How to consolidate these contrasting views? Perhaps the problem is that companies do not see the potential of graphene in the same way as Geim does. Graphene came from blue sky innovative research done by Geim and Novoselov, born more out of curiosity than because of commercial aspirations. Still, when the Nobel prize was awarded to these pioneers, commercial applications featured prominently in the comments of the Nobel Prize committee. This even caused me to call for caution on the technological potential. And it is fair to say that the promised broad-sweeping applications particularly based on graphene’s electronic properties have not yet materialized.

But this does not mean that all is bleak.

First of all, there is commercial interest. The Financial Times mentions several companies that aim to commercialize graphene and to sell it such as Applied Graphene Materials, which have developed a promising fabrication process for graphene.  Others such as Cientifica aim to focus on practical applications. All these companies are based in the UK. And innovation in the UK in graphene is continuing, as Matin Durrani points out in his  response to Chakrabortty’s Guardian article, when he points out the £61m National Graphene Institute that has been set up at the University of Manchester.

Still, in comparison to many other countries, the lack of more a solid manufacturing and innovation industrial base is of disadvantage to the UK. I have briefly discussed this innovation gap on twitter with Richard Jones, who is Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Research and Innovation at Sheffield University:

@joergheber Yes, the gap is the problem. It’s a big one. See also http://t.co/RGw9pDIxPY

— Richard Jones (@RichardALJones) December 3, 2013

The problem of an innovation deficit and the lack of a matching industrial policy is treated in great and very educating detail in Jones’ paper that he highlights in his tweet. Anyone interested in this issue should read this. As he summarizes there:

…when necessary, accepting responsibility for technological innovation will on occasion mean that Government will need to intervene directly to make technological innovation happen.

This is certainly a great point Jones is making there, particularly for the case for huge technological efforts, as was the case for the sequencing of the human genome. Examples that Jones mentions include also the airline industry, computers and pharmaceuticals.

For graphene, the situation might be slightly different. Here, small companies may have a chance. Graphene is cheap to make, and consists of carbon, one of the most abundant chemical elements on the planet. Its commercial potential continues to appeal and includes applications ranging from batteries, small electrical contacts to sensing and many other applications that may not require multi-billion dollar investments on the scale of new pharmaceutical drugs or new generations of silicon electronics.

In the US, financing entrepreneurial companies is comparatively easy, and taking a risk is not seen as a disadvantage. Even younger huge corporations such as Google or Amazon started out as very small businesses. In other words, major technological progress does not necessarily need a national research program. The company that started out as a web search portal a mere 15 years ago is now about to introduce driverless cars. Bottom-up innovations can achieve a lot. In countries such as Germany or Japan, it is often established small and medium-sized companies that commercialize new technology, which often have close relationships with academic researchers and institutions. Such relationships could be developed much better in the UK.

Either way, I believe the same small-scale early commercialization might well be possible for graphene. Closing the innovation gap in graphene may not require a major national programme beyond initiatives such as the National Graphene Institute. However, it will need a change in mindset. It does not help if risk-taking entrepreneurs in the UK are not taken seriously or their efforts prematurely criticised.

Failure should not be a blemish for those trying, and it must be possible that (realistic) visions are backed by sufficient venture capital funding. The government cuts that we have seen to research funding will of course have a dramatic impact on the UK’s ability for innovation. The next breakthrough like graphene may not come from the UK also because of these cuts. Supporting entrepreneurs, however, is not only a structural or political issue, but also requires vision.