NEWS OF THE WEEK IN BRIEF: STILL TICKING
BUSINESS
OLED INVESTMENT Largest firms position themselves in the new display technology
It's been 25 years since they were launched on what was to be a fouryear journey to Jupiter and Saturn, and NASA's twin Voyager spacecraft are stilt going strong. Voyager 1 is about 85 times as far from the Sun as Earth is, and Voyager 2 is a mere 68 times as far. Both are still transmitting data on the far reaches of the solar wind almost daily.
INUNDATED As waters receded from Spolana's site, environmental officials were concerned they might be carrying chemical contaminants.
10
C
H E M I C A L MAKERS BASF,
IN
NATURE'S
DuPont, and Dow Chemical are steppingup their involvement in the organic lightemitting diode industry as markets for the display technology start to take off. BASF, a newcomer to OLEDs, has purchased a stake in Taiwanese OLED display maker Teco Optronics Corp. BASF and Teco are also entering a research partnership in which BASF will develop li^hit-emitting dyes. "We are convinced that the combination of Teco Optronics' outstanding manufacturing ex-
pertise with our traditionally strong dye research will help ensure the market success of OLED display technology," says Markus Kropp, business manager of BASF Future Business. DuPont will market polymerbased OLED displays made at RiTdisplays' new plant in Hsinchu, Taiwan. The plant will ship the first samples of its singlecolor passive matrix displays by the end of the year. It will make multi- and full-color displays in 2003. InJuly, Dow started on a twophase OLED polymer expan-
WAKE
FLOODS SWAMP CENTRAL EUROPE Chemical contamination is only one of many environmental concerns
T
HE CONTINENT S WORST
flooding in recorded history has begun receding from Central Europe. High river waters are moving downstream—
C & E N / A U G U S T 2 6 . 2002
the Elbe, north toward Hamburg, and the Danube, southeast toward the Black Sea—leaving a trail of chemical and other contamination in their wake. Hardest hit has been the Czech Republic, where some 90% of chlorinated chemicals maker Spolana's Neratovice site, located some 12 miles north of Prague, was inundated. Czech and German environmental ministers toured the facility last week to assess theriskof leaks into the Elbe. Zuzana Bluh, press attaché with the Czech Embassy in London, points out that Spolana is not the only Czech chemical plant that is flooded. "It is impossible to say right now what the environmental damage will be,"
sion at its Midland, Mich., site. The first phase is expected to be completed by the end of this year and the second phase by third-quarter 2 0 0 3 . The unit will make red-, green-, and bluelight-emitting polymers, enabling full-color displays. Display consultancy iSuppli/ Stanford Resources estimates the size of the OLED market at $112 million worldwide in 2002, growing to $2.3 billion by 2008. Kimberly Allen, director of technology and strategic research at Stanford Resources, says Dow, Cambridge Display Technology, Avecia's Covion unit, Eastman Kodak, and Idemitsu Kosan are emerging as the leaders in OLED chemicals and polymers. But, she cautions, companies may drop out as the market becomes overcrowded with new players.—ALEX TULL0
she says. "In many places, the water is still there. There will be environmental problems, certainly, but not necessarily from the chemical plants. Other factors, such as sewage contamination, may be even worse." Degussa shut down its plant in the Bitterfeld chemical park and its fine chemicals site near Dresden, but more in response to concerns about interruptions in electricity supply than rising waters. However, more than 120 Bayer employees built barricades using some 13,000 sandbags around the firm's sites in Bitterfeld and Dessau. Degussa, Bayer, and BASF have established funds to assist flood victims, donating as much as $1 million each and matching employee contributions to general charity funds. Additionally, Bayer's star soccer team, Bayer 04 Leverkusen, will play a benefit game in Dresden this week as a fund-raising gesture. As Bayer Chairman Werner Wenning said of the usually competitivefirms,"Nowwe must all stand together in solidarity"— PATRICIA SHORT
HTTP://PUBS.ACS.ORG/CEN
