As chief executive of Cima NanoTech Inc., Jon Brodd keeps an active global itinerary. The St. Paul-based start-up operates a research-and-development center in Israel, and manufacturing and marketing operations out of Japan. ¶ Today, Brodd embarks on perhaps his most high-profile trip: Davos, Switzerland, the site of next week's World Economic Forum, where top political and business leaders including former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Microsoft founder Bill Gates will discuss everything from poverty to global warming.
The forum recently named Cima a "Technology Pioneer," a distinction given to 39 companies around the world this year whose innovative technologies contain the "potential to have a substantial long-term impact on business and society in the future." Past winners include Google, Mozilla and Napster.
Founded in 2002 using Israeli technology, Cima manufactures materials that are used to make plasma television screens, solar cells and radio frequency identification tags in a way that's cheaper and greener. Cima has raised $24 million, mostly from investors in South Korea and Japan, home to major electronic manufacturers such as Panasonic and Sony. The venture-capital backed company is in the "pre-revenue stage."
Cima's technology is "both basic and revolutionary," said Ataru Onuma, senior managing director of Nikko Antfactory, a Japanese venture capital firm and one of Cima's largest investors. "It is not easy to copy."
Broadly defined, nanotechnology is the ability to manipulate matter on a molecular level. Substances behave differently in smaller sizes, which means scientists can alter certain chemical, biological and physical properties to produce everything from stain-resistant clothing and lighter tennis racquets to powerful microchips and sensors.
From small things, big money
Products incorporating nanotechnology generated more than $50 billion in sales in 2006, according to New York consulting firm Lux Research Inc. Venture capitalists poured $699 million into nanotechnology that year, up 10 percent from 2005, Lux said.
Wall Street is also taking notice. In November, Minneapolis-based Piper Jaffray & Co. helped underwrite the $112.7 million initial public offering of Nanosphere Inc., a company that uses gold nanoparticles to develop genetic tests that are faster and cheaper than competing products.