The ability to develop new materials and bring them to market ever faster is an obvious goal. There continues to be countless developments that improve chemistry and materials science R&D, but perhaps none represent the same paradigm shift that materials informatics offers. Major industry players are waking up to this as the technology matures.

Electric vehicle battery packs have increasing requirements concerning their thermal runaway mitigation strategy. Meanwhile, the aerogel industry is overly dependent on oil & gas and in need of diversification. Could this be the perfect match between a problem looking for a solution and a solution looking for a problem?

In-mold electronics enables electronic functionality to be embedded within molded and thermoformed plastic components. With the integration of capacitive touch, lighting, and even haptics alongside size and weight reductions of up to 70%, IME is an efficient approach to making curved touch-sensitive interfaces. Given these benefits, IDTechEx forecasts IME to be a $1.5 billion market by 2032, with applications mainly within the automotive and consumer goods sectors.

In their new report "3D Printing Ceramics 2022-2032: Technology and Market Outlook", IDTechEx forecasts the ceramic 3D printing industry to grow 7-fold to $400M by 2032. Given how young the market is, seven-fold growth in the next 10 years indicates a positive future for the industry.