Organic electronics materials market to grow to US$16 billion by 2015

The market for organic electronics materials will be worth almost US$16 billion by 2015, according to a new report from industry analyst NanoMarkets.

The report analysed the market for the semiconductors, conductors, dielectrics and substrates that will be used in the growing organic electronics industry. It places market worth at US$4.9 billion in 2012 and at US$15.8 billion in 2015.

NanoMarkets estimates that by 2015, 80% of organic electronics materials will be sold into three applications: RFID, display backplanes and OLED lighting and displays. RFID will account for US$6.9 billion in materials sales, with OLEDs accounting for US$5.6 billion.

The analyst firm believes new kinds of organic semiconductor materials — such as rubrene and hybrid materials including formulations with carbon nanotubes — will enable the market to achieve US$4.9 billion in revenues by 2015 as needed improvements in electron mobilities, switching speeds and environmental stability are attained.

Organic electronics will have to emulate the traditional semiconductor industry, says the firm, and invent an organic version of CMOS with its own stable materials sets. To make this happen materials companies must offer commercial quantities of n-type semiconductors and organic dielectrics.

The report also predicts that the substrate business will grow to US$6.9 billion in sales by 2015, with the majority of these substrates of the flexible type and specially prepared for organic electronics through novel forms of barrier coatings and reduced surface roughness.