Electrospinning has gained widespread attention in the research community for more than a decade. With the volume of interests and research output, early innovators and entrepreneurs are bringing this technology beyond its traditional air filtration application to other domains. ElectrospinTech has the privilege to talk to Co-Founder of Revolution Fibres, a New Zealand-based company that has successfully overcome the barrier and commercialized various end-user products using electrospun fibers.

ElectrospinTech: "how did you become interested in nanofibres?"

Iain Hosie: Initially the company I was working for, Cristal Air International, wanted to make the "world's best filter" for home ventilation and air conditioning markets. This gave myself and Simon Feasey (air filter expert and co-founder of Revolution Fibres) the brief to investigate emerging air filter technologies and fit them to our needs. Nanofibre was an obvious choice, but it was the ability to create functional fibres that really sold us on the technology.

ElectrospinTech: What prompted you to start Revolution Fibres?

Iain Hosie: We saw electrospinning in laboratories and wanted to know how we could get our hands on 100,000m² per annum to get started! We were initially just a nanofibre customer. After some pretty in-depth market research and a couple of conferences, we realised not only the benefits in air filtration but in multiple other markets. So we asked researchers why this technology wasn't being commercialized and the reason appeared to be the same as our conundrum - there was an obvious lack of commercial producers prepared to take the technology further. We saw a technology with huge potential trapped in laboratories, and set a goal to take nanofibres to the global market.

ElectrospinTech: Research has found numerous potential applications for electrospun nanofibers. However, commercial products are just a fraction of it. What do you think are the reasons behind the low or slow translation from laboratory to commercial products?

Iain Hosie: As a manufacturer (and commercialization partner), we get many enquiries of what nanofibre can offer. As a platform technology, it is often very easy to apply nanofibres properties to a commercial need. However the challenge is to find commercial partners who are willing to invest in the R&D required to get nanofibre to a point where it a) works in the chosen application; b) is able to be manufactured (supply of raw materials, technical specifications, rolled-good or other formats); and c) can meet the cost and scale barriers. Generally every fibre we make is custom-built for the client. We have had good success in making nanofibre products in NZ, which is surprising considering our companies are some of the lowest investors in R&D in the OECD (average 0.8% of company turnover put into R&D). It shows promise for our international ventures, and hopefully our track record in NZ will attract more work from overseas.

ElectrospinTech: How can the electrospinning community (academia and industry) work together to address the slow rate of commercialization?

Iain Hosie: Generally technology providers who wish to commercialize their nanofibre ideas have two choices - become a nanofibre manufacturer themselves or encourage the industrial end-user to be the manufacturer where they need to buy an Elmarco machine (for example) and invest in significant expertise and special facilities. This holds up development immensely. We see too many nanofibre producers trying to "go it alone" with their own technologies. Finetex are a good example of a company that has done this well. But most of us are small enterprises, and require good strong partnerships to push our products into the market. To achieve real growth we need the users of nanofibre to be better engaged in the commercialization, rather than the nanofibre experts getting into markets they do not understand

Researchers should be involving electrospinning manufacturers earlier in their research - not just to advise on manufacture (and pilot-scale runs / prototypes), but to advise on other commercial considerations that will affect a product to be made cost-effectively. Researchers rarely consider manufacturing considerations such as the correct solvents, substrates, raw polymer supply chain, product shelf life, etc. Furthermore, companies interested in nanofibre should work closely with existing manufacturers before investing in their own facilities. It will help create a market and demand before such large investments are required (which inevitably take longer to gain approval and are higher risk).

ElectrospinTech: How important is intellectual property in this market?

Iain Hosie: As this is a "technology push" market (the innovation is happening in academia, not industry) we see many, many papers and patents every year. For a technology that has few examples of commercialization, it is over-represented in patents. Most of these are held by researchers in areas that they have no hope of commercializing. This creates massive barriers to launching product and also getting investment (everyone wants a unique piece of IP). So I think the research community needs to open the doors more to industry or create that link between end-users and manufacturers.

ElectrospinTech: If you have unlimited research budget, what are the short term and long term research goal that you would like to pursue that will benefit Revolution Fibres?

Iain Hosie: We are seeing emerging markets opening up all the time, but I strongly believe the "killer app" for nanofibre is yet to be discovered. or is at lab scale somewhere. As a manufacturer the medical market is appealing but the regulatory hurdles are insurmountable without funding. So we are focussing most of our attention in niche areas which show promise but are not yet common-place uses for nanofibre. I can't say too much obviously!

Internally we are always working on increasing our fibre "library" to have a wide range of properties we can adapt to suit various uses. This is continually growing. And of course increasing speed of production - to drive the cost down and open up newer markets.

ElectrospinTech: There are many electrospinning mass production concepts out there (nozzle, nozzle free, gas assisted etc.), each having their merits. How would you list, in order of priority, the requirements for selecting a concept?

Iain Hosie: The general perception is "speed" but I see that as a misconception to be honest. Sure it is not as cheap and rapid as other fibre making techniques, but does it need to be as fast and cheap? We see fascinating properties that require very little nanofibre, and it acts as a great enhancement to existing fibres (microfiber, textiles). Electrospinning has reached massive scale in the past (Russia in the 1930's etc), and there are some examples of it reaching good scale again. The air filter companies (Donaldson, etc) are doing it. We could get to scale very quickly given the commercial need.

Some applications require a very definite fibre diameter and density (e.g. filters and composite reinforcement) and so suit electrospinning, some require mass production to keep cost down (e.g. absorbent pads) so there are faster methods. Nozzles can give you very precise parameters and are good for research, but are not practical at large scale. We rarely see R&D from nozzles translate into our technique for example, I'd imagine other large nanofibre machines would be the same.

For us we require an electrospinning technique that suits as wide a variety of polymers and solvents as possible, such is the nature of our services. Other's may find a technique works for their one or two applications and I say if it works, stick with it!

About Iain Hosie

Iain Hosie is co-founder, Technical Director and acting CEO of Revolution Fibres Ltd. Iain heads the Technical Development Strategy, Services, and Sales and Marketing activities in Revolution Fibres.

Prior to this role, Iain has worked in environmental health (ESR, Institute of Occupational Medicine, Edinburgh), government policy and regulatory roles (ERMA, Ministry for the Environment), and media relations and PR (Cristal Air International Ltd).

About Revolution Fibres

Revolution Fibres is one of the world's leading and most diverse producers of nanofibre, based in Auckland New Zealand. Revolution Fibres has created lab, pilot and industrial-scale electrospinning machines (Sonic Electrospinning Technology) that have the flexibility and capacity to produce commercial quantities of nanofibre. Along the way, Revolution Fibres has developed nanofibre products in key markets such as air filters (SetaT), cosmetic and natural health products (actiVLayrT) and carbon fibre reinforcement products (Xantu.LayrT).

Recognized as NZ's Most Innovative Business (NZ Innovation Awards 2012 Supreme Winner) and with strong engineering and scientific acumen (NZ Engineering Excellence Awards 2012), Revolution Fibres has unique expertise and production capacity, and is well-placed to exploit nanofibre technology and develop high value applications within our key export markets. They are taking a flexible product development approach to create customized nanofibre for unique commercial applications.