25 January, 2023
There is full speed ahead at our European partners to reach the next step on the road to commercial sensors. With Engineering Samples in place, meaning that the production flow that gave us Working Samples is repeatable, we will obtain a large enough volume to start sending sensors to customers for evaluation. Already today, many have registered their interest. Right now, work is underway to establish stable sub-processes, go through risk levels (P-FMEA), analyze and evaluate quality outcomes, and quality-assure Varioprint’s operational work.
Since we presented the news on November 7 that we had reached the milestone and passed the needle’s eye Working Samples, we have entered a new phase. Now it’s about ensuring a repeatable production flow that delivers a satisfactory outcome every time. We were able to tell you about an important partial victory just before the turn of the year when we managed to complete (industrialize) the three chemical mixtures in collaboration with our partner Schlötter, one of the most critical steps. We have already processed a few full-scale panels and see that everything is working as planned.
During January, several panels have moved on into the POST process (the steps where we complete the product after we have established the nano threads in the foil). The plan is to complete a larger number of panels during February and March to create a buffer with sensor elements that we can start sending to customers and prospects for evaluation.
An important part of the work to complete commercial sensors is to achieve Production Readiness. In addition to passing all qualification tests, this also means that all documentation must be in place. Our documentation includes identifying and risk assessing all sub-processes to be able to safely enter a production mode. This is especially important as we outsource the production and are not actively on site and participating in the daily work. This work has now come a long way. The status now in January 2023 is that we have succeeded in reducing nearly 90% of the identified risks that we documented during the mapping in 2021. An important accomplishment is that we have managed to eliminate all high risks (>500).
In addition, we evaluate the quality of our nanowires in collaboration with the German research institute Fraunhofer IZM. This is especially important because the nanowires are both the most critical and unique part of our product. We have collaborated with IZM for many years and the results coming out now are the best produced. Metals and transitions show such a high quality that it makes us ready to go into stress tests to confirm that the good results we see also pass the existing standard tests.
An activity that, for natural reasons, has not yet been put into operation is to check performance in an automatic mode and pack approved units in customer packaging. However, we already have developed a collaboration with the company Aptasic in Switzerland, which has solid competence in testing and packaging. They have all the appropriate equipment for this, which they have also modified to fit our product. They are ready to evaluate this sub-process when we have received completed panels with working elements.
Right now, we are running activities according to plan. The most important thing for us is to do things right rather than quickly. We already passed through the needle’s eye when we reached Working Samples. Now there remains a structured work to put everything in the right place so that we can send out sensor elements to the customers who want to start evaluating the product to be able to place delivery orders to JonDeTech later this year.
