The agreement will focus on the global marketing and distribution of Haydale’s functionalised graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs), which are designed to enhance product performance when compared to non-functionalised materials; they are suitable for numerous applications including resins, epoxies and polymer composites.

A major player in the R&D world, Goodfellow is widely accepted as the premier global distributor of advanced materials for research, development, prototyping and specialised manufacturing. Goodfellow’s offices in the UK, USA, France, Germany and China, along with its network of global distributors, will be able to promote this innovative product to hundreds of thousands of researchers around the world. In addition to being a materials supplier, Goodfellow offers a team of materials experts and an extensive knowledge base built up over years of experience dealing with the research community, making the company a valuable resource for research scientists.

The non-exclusive agreement with Goodfellow marks Haydale’s intent to increase its presence across the global R&D market, and will see the HDPlas range of functionalised GNPs made available to R&D customers. Goodfellow will initially offer HDPlas O2 oxygen-functionalised GNPs as a trial pack containing 2g each of material with low, medium and high levels of functionalisation. The offer will expand within the coming months to include further products from Haydale’s HDPlas range.

Ray Gibbs, CEO at Haydale, commented: “This agreement with Goodfellow is integral to the distribution of our functionalised GNPs across the global R&D market. Goodfellow’s extensive customer base will be instrumental in achieving greater access and visibility for our HDPlas range, giving more R&D customers worldwide the opportunity to test and analyse our plasma functionalised material for integration into their products and applications. The endorsement of being included among their suppliers is a great step forward for us, and we are delighted that Goodfellow has agreed to list our GNP product.”

He added: “It is our ability to functionalise GNPs to a customer’s specific requirements that uniquely positions us in the market for graphene nanomaterial products in terms of providing a key to graphene’s commercialisation. We look forward to working closely with the Goodfellow team to develop and deliver the HDPlas range internationally.”

Stephen Aldersley, Managing Director of Goodfellow, believes that the new relationship with Haydale is an important expansion of Goodfellow’s activities in the field of nanoparticles in general and graphene in particular. “The Haydale product can demonstrate significant advantages over other functionalisation methods, and we are pleased to be promoting their products to our global customer base in this very important research area."

Following the discovery by Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov in 2004, graphene has been heralded as a scientific revolution in the 21st century due to its exceptional physical and mechanical properties. However, questions still remain over the commercial reality of delivering graphene and the relevance it has to real products and applications. The Haydale plasma functionalisation process has the potential to offer tailored surface modification of graphene nanomaterials whilst maintaining structural integrity, eliminating a key barrier to the commercialisation of graphene.

The process can clean up any material impurities inherent in the raw material and may even repair defects in the base material. The process can provide customised functionalisation with a wide range of chemical groups not available from other functionalisation techniques, allowing Haydale to match a product with the most appropriate functionalisation to meet customer specifications.