Advancing the Japanese chemical industry: Kusumoto Chemicals and OCSiAl announce the manufacturing and marketing of TUBALL-based products in Japan

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The world’s first technology for the mass production of high-quality yet low-cost single wall carbon nanotubes is now entering the Japanese market – Japan is in fact the birthplace of carbon nanotubes, where they were first discovered more than 25 years ago by Sumio Iijima. The longstanding partnership between Kusumoto Chemicals, one of the leading Japanese specialty chemicals companies, and OCSiAl Group, the world leader in single wall carbon nanotube production, has now evolved into an exclusive contract for exploiting OCSiAl technology and know-how to manufacture and market of TUBALL-based suspensions, masterbatches and a line of pre-dispersed concentrates TUBALL MATRIX in Japan.

The dominance of OCSiAl’s TUBALL single wall carbon nanotubes is related to their exceptional properties, such as superior conductivity to weight ratio and high temperature resistance, strength and length-to-diameter ratio (>2500). As little as 0.01% of TUBALL enables manufacturers to use less raw material while producing more high-performance end products.

“OCSiAl works closely with partners all around the world, and we are hugely excited to have such an influential partner in Japan. The volume of TUBALL purchased by Kusumoto Chemicals is sufficient for organising the production line and meeting the market needs for these advanced additives. The company has been granted an exclusive license to exploit OCSiAl’s technology and know-how to produce and market in Japan the expanded line of suspensions, masterbatches and pre-dispersed concentrates TUBALL MATRIX”, noted Grigory Gurevich, OCSiAl Senior Vice President and CEO of OCSiAl Hong Kong.

Kusumoto Chemicals now also enjoys an exclusive right to produce and commercialise the TUBALL MATRIX line of concentrates, a novel product that has no analogue yet. Pioneering technology enables these concentrates to provide materials with conductivity and to enhance their mechanical properties without any negative influence on their colour or rheological properties. TUBALL MATRIX concentrates will contribute to the Japanese automotive, petrochemical, oil and gas, healthcare, pharmaceutical and electronics industries, blazing a trail for adding significant value to a vast number of products.

The Japanese chemical industry is the third largest in the world and it accounts for 14% of all Japanese manufacturing output. The strong points of the chemical industry in Japan are innovation and quality. “Kusumoto Chemicals realises that modern civilisation is now at the stage where we need to advance existing materials significantly. The exceptional properties of single wall carbon nanotubes have attracted great interest from manufacturers who want to improve their properties. However, the availability of predispersed off-the-shelf TUBALL-based concentrates now gives us the opportunity to genuinely boost their industrial application”, commented Mr Kai-San, Kusumoto Chemicals Corporate Officer.