Connora Technologies and Aditya Birla Chemicals form Partnership to Scale up Amine Chemistry for Recyclable Composites
Hayward, California USA (PRWEB) September 26, 2016 -- Connora Technologies, Inc. (USA) and Aditya Birla Chemicals’ Epoxy Division (India, Thailand, & Germany) today announced a Joint Development Agreement to scale-up the manufacturing of Connora’s recyclable epoxy thermoset technology called Recyclamine®. The two companies are now developing metric-ton scale manufacturing processes for Recyclamine®, previously demonstrated at pilot scale. Connora has developed a novel proprietary amine synthesis platform to make Recyclamines®. Aditya Birla Chemicals, a top multinational manufacturer of epoxy resins and curing agents, is contributing infrastructure, capabilities, and resources to Connora towards scale-up and commercialization of Recyclamine technology. Connora’s CEO, Dr. Rey Banatao, explains, “As a start-up company, we have been working extremely hard over the past several years to gain the validation of a large and well respected global manufacturing partner such as Aditya Birla Chemicals. Their decades of expertise in scale-up manufacturing and sales of epoxy resins, on a global scale, is invaluable to Connora at this stage of technology commercialization.” Co-founder and CTO, Dr. Stefan Pastine adds, “From the start, we knew the chemistry would have to be designed to be industrially scalable, but it was no small task. The fact that Aditya Birla Chemicals believes in our mission of making thermosets recyclable, and is willing to invest in its development, is tremendous validation.”
Polyamines are used in diverse applications from fuel additives and lubricants, to cross-linkers in high performance thermoset plastics, such as epoxy resin or polyurethanes. Epoxy thermosets are traditionally the material of choice in adhesive, coating, and lightweighting in the electronics, aerospace, automotive, windmill, and sporting goods industries. Connora’s Recyclamine® synthesis platform provides a modular and rapid chemistry approach for making new polyamine molecules. A unique and patented feature of Recyclamines® is their ability to create cured resins that can be recycled into a reusable thermoplastic, thus enabling true ‘end-of-life’ recycling and ‘zero-waste manufacturing’ in the thermoset composites industry. “We had our eye on Connora from its early days, due the potential disruption their technology could bring in an industry that hasn’t changed all that much in the past 30 years,” say Pradip Kumar Dubey, President of Aditya Birla Chemicals Epoxy Division. “Perhaps just as remarkable as what Recyclamine® technology could enable for the industry, is the fact that Connora has devised a completely new platform to manufacture polyamines, and one that doesn’t have the same toxicity or handling risks that are typically associated with the manufacture of the conventional amines used in the epoxy industry today.”
The efficient recycling of composite materials should have a positive impact in the automotive and aerospace industries, where the trend to make lighter, stronger, and more energy efficient vehicles is driving growth in the use of carbon fiber composite materials. Composites Industry reports state that the manufacturing of composites today generates 5-40% of raw inputs as waste materials, for which there are few options in recycling or reuse. Making composites more recyclable through the use of Recyclamine® should help reduce the overall cost of manufacturing composite products, by re-integrating composite waste and reducing landfill costs.
About Connora Technologies, Inc.
Based in Hayward, CA. USA, Connora Technologies is a next-generation chemical company with expertise in design of performance thermoset materials. Their revolutionary Recyclamine® polymer technology forms the basis for creating a new market around transformable and reusable thermoset plastics. Recyclamines® balance performance, cost, manufacturability, and recyclability and deliver a new class of diverse performance polymers. Connora offers “bottom up” molecular synthesis expertise to the polymers industry. Connora has also recently launched an electronics division based on Connora Smart Dielectric [CSD®] films, in order to address cost and performance limitations in electronic materials.
For more information, visit http://www.connoratech.com
Email: info(at)connoratech(dot)com
Phone: +1 (415) 315-9524
About Aditya Birla Chemicals
Aditya Birla Chemicals is a leading manufacturer of bulk and specialty chemicals and viscose filament yarn. The business is spread across multiple manufacturing locations in four countries – India, Thailand, Germany and China. The business is creating a strong footprint in the chemicals industry – it is a market leader in the chlor-alkali segment in India; at the number two position in viscose filament yarn and is the third largest manufacturer in the world of sulphites.
Aditya Birla Chemicals manufactures epoxy resins in liquid, solid, solutions, blends and multifunctional forms, and markets these under the Epotec brand. These high-quality epoxies find wide application in the automotive, construction, heavy engineering, transport, electronics, food and beverage packing, coatings, composites, adhesives, aviation, aerospace and wind energy industries.
The Chemicals business has 14 manufacturing sites – seven in India, five in Thailand, one in Germany and one in China. These operations are handled through three companies in India – Aditya Birla Nuvo, Grasim Industries and Tanfac; two companies in Thailand – Aditya Birla Chemicals (Thailand) and Thai Peroxide Company and one company in Germany – Aditya Birla Chemicals (Europe) Gmbh. In China, the business operates through Aditya Birla Grasun Chemicals (Fangchenggang). Aditya Birla Chemicals (India) Limited ("ABCIL") was merged with Grasim on 01st April 2015. This merger consolidated Grasim's leadership position in the domestic chlor-alkali industry with its capacity increasing from 452,500 tpa to 884,200 tpa.
For more information, visit:
http://www.adityabirlachemicals.com/products/epoxy_resins/epoxy_resins_overview.html
Email: rungrawee.panyakaew(at)adityabirla(dot)com
Phone: +6638683981
Dr. Rey Banatao, Connora Technologies, http://www.connoratech.com/, +1 (415) 315-9524, [email protected]
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