Plastic electronics developer Plastic Logic (Mountain View, California / USA; www.plasticlogic.com) has entered into an agreement with the Russian Corporation of Nanotechnologies (Rusnano, Moscow / Russia; www.rusnano.com) to create the California firm’s second production plant for plastic-based electronic displays and help establish a plastic electronics industry in Russia. A date for commercialisation of the new facility has not been divulged. In the deal, which has lent fuel to the UK debate over foreign takeovers, Rusnano will make what is believed to be a significant cash injection in Plastic Logic (Europe: Plastic Logic Ltd; Cambridge / UK). Commenting on the agreement, Plastic Logic CEO Richard Archuleta said the Russian investment “will enable us to dramatically expand operations in support of volume production of our next-generation products.”

The initial application for the Plastic Logic technology is an extremely thin, lightweight, robust and flexible active matrix display (e-reader) that is said to be unique in the marketplace. This forms the basis of the company’s first commercial consumer electronics product, a next-generation electronic reader for business currently under development. The Russian production facility will be the first step toward establishing a new branch of the electronics industry in the country, said Rusnano managing director Georgy Kolpachev. “By the time of the launch, the Russian facility will be the world’s most advanced fabrication plant in the plastic electronics industry,” he added. Plastic Logic will maintain its high-volume, commercial factory in Dresden / Germany, which opened in 2008 – see Plasteurope.com of 29.09.2008 – and its R&D facility in Cambridge / UK. It expects plastic electronics technology to ultimately replace traditional silicon, semiconductor, glass-based, display products in a variety of devices.