Graphene and carbon nanotubes: market, technology and opportunity analysis from 2019 to 2029

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This report analyzes in detail the technological and commercial progress and prospects of graphene, carbon nanotubes and other two-dimensional materials other than graphene. This grouping of material technologies is meaningful, because although graphene and carbon nanotubes are different in morphology, they have a lot in common; non-graphene two-dimensional materials are expected to provide complementary properties.

Why choose IDTechEx for the research of graphene, carbon nanotubes and non-graphene two-dimensional materials?

This report is the result of our continuous research over the years. We released the first reports on CNTs and graphene in 2011 and 2012 respectively. In addition to the initial research, we personally organized 13 business-themed events in Europe and the United States; since then, we have also participated in 10 non-IDTechEx related conferences and/or presentations in Asia, Europe and the United States; we We interviewed more than 140 participants around the world; we held 12 master classes for business leaders; we also completed 7 important consulting projects. All of this gives us an unparalleled in-depth understanding of these industries.

Our other unique advantage is that we have extensive and in-depth reports on the end-use market of these materials. In fact, we have a series of independent reports on such topics. This expertise in the end-use market enables us to better understand the competitive landscape of these materials.

Carbon nanotubes: a brief overview

CNT is almost thirty years old. During this period of time, it almost traversed the entire hype curve, from its academic origin to the peak of hype, and then almost disappeared into the bottom of disillusionment. However, CNTs have made a comeback quietly now, and they have indeed entered a stage of quantitative growth.

Like graphene and many other similar carbon additive materials, CNT is not a single type of material, but a large class of materials. The diameters of CNTs on the market range from nearly 1 nanometer to several hundred nanometers, ranging from single-wall (SWCNT) to multi-wall (MWCNT) and carbon nanofibers. Similarly, the length of the tube varies from a few microns to 2 mm.
 
Each type of CNT is a different material: different production methods, different processing methods, and different use methods. This diversity is also reflected in prices, which cover almost six orders of magnitude (from the highest cost SWCNT to the lowest cost MWCNT).

The evolution of the multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT) market: quietly entering the stage of volume growth
The production of multi-walled carbon nanotubes mainly uses the C-CVD process (catalytic chemical vapor deposition). The global cumulative production of MWCNTs changes as shown in the figure below. Please note that commercialization began approximately in 2005/2006. Then, the super hype started, leading to a sharp increase in production lines. This has prompted the industry to fall into a state of overcapacity. What‘s worse, many people are forced to produce CNTs that are not good enough to meaningfully replace carbon black or similar products.

Left: MWCNTs historical and predicted price changes over time. The exact value in this graph has been deleted, but you can see that the price has dropped by nearly 100 times. Right: The global cumulative production capacity as a function of time tells the story of market evolution. Source: IDTechEx Research

Therefore, in the face of disappointing prospects, some people have left the industry, leading to a certain adjustment in overall production capacity. Then, as some people entered and left, global production capacity remained generally unchanged. But the important thing is that capacity utilization rates began to rise slowly.
 
Our analysis is that the market has now entered a period of volume growth. Now the application of MWCNT in conductive plastics is very mature and is constantly expanding. At the same time, it has also been added to new polymer materials, such as elastomers. More importantly, its applications in batteries are also increasing. This is even more important, because the battery market is an upgraded market. Due to the large demand for large batteries for electric vehicles, the emergence of electric vehicles that operate under high charge and discharge conditions will cause the battery market itself to usher in rapid growth. .

In general, like most carbon-based materials, the target markets of CNTs are also diverse, which makes the prospect of CNTs flexible. According to our assessment, the increase in demand will soon become apparent with the increase in production capacity. This process has already begun more than a year ago after a 100-ton factory in Asia was put into operation. This trend will continue.
 
Like graphene, CNT is often an alternative additive. Therefore, they must compete with their counterpart products in terms of price and performance. This has caused long-term pressure to reduce costs. Therefore, the industry has no choice but to cut production costs. At this point, it has achieved good results.
 
This also shows the price change of CNT in the chart here. The blue dots show historical prices, and the red ones are our predictions for the future: the curve is very steep, and prices have fallen by two orders of magnitude.

This price and quantity competition has largely commoditized MWCNT‘s supply business. However, this does not mean that all differences in material quality have disappeared, because there are many different varieties of MWCNTs on the market. The difference in quality, depending on the application, will manifest as a small price difference, allowing the market to retain some special chemical characteristics.

Single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) become more marketable and more affordable?
The CNT story is not all about MWCNT. In fact, due to the higher surface-to-volume ratio of SWCNTs, single-walled carbon nanotubes have superior single-tube performance. However, they are more difficult to grow, more costly, and are a hybrid product of metal and semiconductor, and more difficult to disperse, although the weight percentage involved in the same or better effect may be lower. The combination of these three characteristics limits its market to a few niche electronic devices.
 
Now, some companies are looking to change this situation and provide more prices and available SWCNT. The price and volume leader is emerging, hoping to move SWCNT closer to the high-performance MWCNT in the market positioning. These SWCNTs may compete with MWCNTs as alternatives in some applications, but what is more interesting is that although their impurity content is moderate to high, they will open up new applications (in growth types).

An interesting application is that they can achieve colored (versus black) conductive adhesives due to their ultra-low loading levels. We assess that this and similar SWCNTs will first find a market that can provide customers with this additional value because they still cannot directly compete on cost.

Graphene: finally out of the laboratory, to the market?

Graphene is also experiencing its own hype curve. It can be said that it is now in that valley of disillusionment. However, the commercialization of graphene is progressing steadily. This can be summarized by the following main trends.
 
1. The industry experience continues to increase. In the early days, graphene was overused as a magical material, which would completely change almost all industries overnight. However, as time goes by, people slowly return to reality. Nowadays, graphene has been correctly recognized by more and more people and is regarded as one of the broad carbon additive materials.

In addition, the market is now aware that there are many graphene materials, and not all graphene materials are the same. Therefore, users have now accepted the view that the winning material cannot be determined a priori, because the final application-level results are affected by many parameters, such as graphene morphology, formulation/blending technology and conditions.

2. Usability is getting higher and higher. Graphene has a variety of useful properties, so the application channels are also diverse. However, most target applications are mass markets. Therefore, suppliers must take risks and invest in mass production when demand is small and uncertain. This is inevitable, otherwise, the supplier can never go beyond the prototype design or performance demonstration stage. This process (production capacity) has made such significant progress on a global scale that in the medium term, availability is not a major industry issue.

Interestingly, as many industries are now familiar with, China has become the territory of nominal production capacity. Its rise has also made the direct liquid phase stripping process a leading process in terms of production capacity. This is because many Chinese manufacturers are not part of the first wave of graphene companies, they rely on the rGO process at that time.
 
3. Higher and higher tolerance. Similar to CNTs, graphene is largely an alternative material. Therefore, it must compete with existing solutions in terms of price and performance. As a new special material, graphene has suffered due to the high difference (order of magnitude) in price and pricing strategy.
 
This situation has changed. At present, the price of the graphene sector has fallen and is beginning to converge. However, the price will not be settled around a single point, which reflects the diversity of graphene types and also gives graphene special chemical properties. In addition, suppliers are unwilling to further cut costs out of concerns about premature commercialization, although the continuation of this trend is inevitable.

4. The sales volume and income continue to increase. Our data shows that since 2013, graphene company-level revenue has been steadily increasing. This increase is mainly reflected in the overall situation. This increase will continue at a similar rate until 2020/21. Our model shows that around this period, the market will have an inflection point, and the market will enter a stage of rapid volume growth. .
 
5. Income growth is not always accompanied by an increase in profits. In fact, the situation is often the opposite, with losses increasing in tandem with income. In fact, despite the existence of several profitable companies, the entire industry is still at a loss.
 
This situation is not surprising, but it is likely to change soon. Experience shows that the commercialization of new materials takes years or even decades. Graphene is no exception. Therefore, we believe that this behavior is a natural phenomenon in the development of the industry.

We predict that in the next ten years, at the material supply level, a market of about 300 million US dollars will be formed. Since graphene is still an additive material to a large extent, this means that in the next few years, we will find that different types of graphene will appear in numerous mass production applications. It is worth remembering that this success will not be achieved overnight, but the result of unwavering global research and commercialization efforts in the past two decades.

Non-graphene two-dimensional material?
These materials are still largely at the academic stage. However, these materials have great long-term prospects because they can complement the properties of graphene. For example, they can add insulating or semiconductor (large band gap) two-dimensional materials to the material selection menu. In this report, we will outline some of the latest developments, especially focusing on their needs in future electronic applications.

What does this report provide?
The gap between ideal graphene and non-ideal graphene and CNT

The diversity of graphene and the diversity of various CNT forms on the market

Global graphene and various CNT pricing evolution, trends and strategies

The nominal production capacity of global graphene and various CNT suppliers

Classification of graphene and CNT manufacturers by production process

Various trends such as publication and patent applications.

Company revenue and profit/loss trends

Company valuation trends

A specific survey on China (graphene), including China‘s major emerging suppliers, applications and prices.

Graphene and CNT application examples, pipeline and degree of preparation

10-year market segment forecast

Graphene (sheet and film) ten-year application segment market forecast, in tons and value.

Here, we cover energy storage (lithium ion, silicon anode, LiS, supercapacitors, etc.); composite materials (mechanical enhancement, penetration enhancement, electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, EMI shielding, conductive 3D printing filaments, tires, etc.); inks and Coatings (anti-corrosion coatings, RFID antennas, others); transistors, transparent conductive films, thermal interface materials, etc.

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Source: Graphene information editing and collation.
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