KARIM FORESIGHTING ON MICROINJECTION MOULDING TECHNOLOGY

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1 Karim Market Report: Opportunities for European SMEs Demonstrator microfluidics component and Ra plot of moulded surface (6nm baseline) KARIM KARIM FORESIGHTING ON MICROINJECTION MOULDING TECHNOLOGY

2 Executive Summary Microinjection moulding will provide a stepchange technology to a large number of industry from electronics, medical devices to the healthcare sector as conventional injection moulding of mass parts with large features is replaced by microinjection moulding which uses less polymeric material in the mass manufacture of smaller polymer parts which have improved performance capabilities. The driving factors are threefold; improved technology allow mass manufactured parts; end-user demands desiring smaller, high performance parts and also environmental where the cost of using conventional methods become more expensive (waste product). The key growth market for industry in Europe is expected to be in Microfluidics. The entire market for Microfluidics for New Medical Devices is expected to reach $4.5 Billion in In the microfluidics market, $1.3 billion will accrue to material suppliers for glass, polymers, and silicon. In the sensing electrodes market, material suppliers will garner $3 billion, or 60% of the total, for materials like functionalized adhesives and novel sensing elements. Both new technologies (Bulk metallic Glass) and new high value manufacturing skills are needed to capture this growing market, but the benefits are clear as seen in the microfluidic market; key highlights of this market include; The microfluidic device market will reach $5 Billion in This corresponds to the market of the first level packaged devices, without biological content. Polymer is and will remain the main substrate for microfluidic applications. The market of polymer based microfluidic devices will exceed $2.5 Billion in Clinical and Point of care diagnostics account for 75% of the polymer chip market Trends The microfluidic market is valued at 4.5 billion in the next 8 years. 1 Market dynamics, lower costs and technical advances will drive the cost of materials for a microfluidic device 32% lower to about $0.50 in While glass will still contribute 50% to the total cost, the share of polymers will double to 10% as platforms using cheaper polymer-based consumables gain market share. 2 Enabling Technologies such as Bulk metallic glass, will allow mass manufacturing of polymer parts for a range of industry with submicron features at a lower manufacturing costs than current technology.

3 Overview of Microinjection Moulding 1.0 Introduction; Material and Manufacturing method; of microinjection moulding Increasingly micro manufacturing technology is increasingly attracting interest in order to develop new products with high added value. These new technologies allow the manufacture precision components; these new micro components carry out the functions previously performed by larger parts. Microinjection moulding is one of these new technologies that will replace injection moulding in many high value industries. 1.1 Injection Moulding Injection moulding is a long established process for manufacture of polymer components with surface features as fine as 10-4 m. However there is a growing market for components for micro engineering applications or for multi-scale components in the 10-3 to 10-1 m size range with sub-micron surface features. Microinjection moulding will not the solely developed by a machine or a micron (or nano) insert, it will be a mixture of new technologies or processes in material, machinery and manufacturing method. Examples of companies which have quantified the benefit of using microinjection moulding can be up to 30-60% less polymer material needed Market for micro injection moulding The development of MEMS and Microsystems (MST) is inspiring the global trend towards miniaturization, which is creating a huge market for micro components with micro/nano scale features, especially microfluidic devices, which have wide applications in chemical, biological and medical diagnostics, etc. 4 Currently, the dimensions of micro channels form microfluidic devices range from 10 to 100 μm and even extend to the submicron and nanometre scale for manipulation and measurement of individual molecules. 5 Nanophotonic, super hydrophobic surfaces and optical gratings are all macro in scale, but they all have surface features in micro/nano scale. The global microfluidics market in 2009 was estimated at over $2.1 billion, with large growth expected, reaching 4-5 billion in the next 10 years; Figure 1: Applications and share of technology for microfluidic technologies. 1.3 Manufacturing Method; Moving from bulk to Micron

4 Injection moulding, as distinct from microinjection moulding, is used to form thermoplastic polymers on length scales ranging from 10 0 to 10-5 m for applications that range from the toy industry to micro gears in the watch industry. Injection moulding with sub-micron features is not unique. Polycarbonate CDs, DVDs and ultrahigh density blue-ray discs all have features with dimensions that extend from 500 nm to 138 nm, these are typically manufactured using this process. 6 Such operations often rely on the production of metal stamps which are ultimately derived from laser-etched glass master tools produced in a clean-room environment. However, tools fabricated directly from silicon are too brittle for high force and high volume applications while electroforming process of nickel microstructures as a metallic tool is slow and time consuming, and cannot provide high aspect ratio features. Therefore to capitalise on the growth in microinjection markets other technologies are needed in the manufacture of microparts. The options are; Crystalline tool steel inserts are widely used for injection moulding machining. While limited in use (small features machining applications) they are still considered the current industry standard for mass polymer manufacture. The use of nickel inserts for microinjection moulding applications has been published, but is limited by high aspect ratios. Bulk Metallic Glass inserts allow the machining of the sub-micrometres features on polymer with an high aspect ratio, section Material and Challenges in next generation micromoulded parts Polymer is the most promising material for microparts, due to its low cost, available fabrication technologies and wide range of mechanical and optical properties and chemical resistances, etc. On the basis of conventional injection moulding technology, micro injection moulding has demonstrated itself to be a key enabling fabrication technology for mass production of polymer micro components with complex shapes and products with high-quality surface features, e.g. microfluidic devices. While glass can be used to make microparts, the benefits of polymers in mass manufacturing low cost methods, makes it the foundation material in the µfuture. In order to maintain their functionality, all the micro/nano features of a fabricated polymer part must have high accuracy and good reproducibility, even whilst being manufactured in high volumes. However,

5 interfacial effects, such as capillary forces, friction, and entrapped air strongly influence the filling behaviour of micro/nano scale features. Premature solidification can occur because of the significant thermal diffusion rate associated with the high surface-tovolume ratio and reduced dimensions of micro/nano features; this usually prevents polymer melts from completely filling into micro/nano cavities. The friction and sticking force during the demoulding process can also damage features which have relatively low mechanical properties. The process for micro injection moulding differs significantly from the conventional polymer moulding process as micro parts and micro/nano features have very high surface to volume ratios, which means that heat diffusion effects are significant. This means that the polymer melt solidifies more quickly than in conventional injection moulding. Elevated temperatures and higher pressures are usually required to force the polymer melt into micro cavities as quickly as possible. This causes polymer melt to experience very high shear rates and very high thermal gradients during micro injection moulding. Melt rheology under such extreme conditions controls the polymer flow behaviour at the micro/nano meter scale. Microinjection therefore moulding will require new types of inserts which will impart micron and submicron features, next generation tooling requirements; 1.5 Machinery Microinjection moulding will often use the same equipment in injection moulding, however the inserts will be modified to allow micron featuring. This will bring technical challenges both in the design of future moulds that will allow rapid large scale micron and sub-micron featuring s and also the skill of the operator e.g. solification, the flow of polymers in micron channels etc. is very different from bulk polymer properties. Companies such as Accu-mould in the USA develop a wide range of micro-moulding solutions to help companies develop their capabilities in micro injection moulding. Market 2.0 Market Drivers The market drivers are a mixture of the classic push-pull scenarios. The pull scenario is from industry looking to add features, use less materials, improve performance and from end users who require or demand smaller parts (e.g. microsurgery in the healthcare sector and smaller hearing aids from consumers). The push factor is coming from innovative industry developing new manufacturing technologies and also academia research that have developed a range of materials for manufacturing tool inserts capable of reproducing submicron features, to meet end

6 user demands. Market growth areas driving miniaturisation include healthcare, micro optics, micro electronics, aviation and automobile electronics. 2.1 Key driving Factors for microfluidics Factors driving industry research and product development are: The requirement for micro/nano sized features. The ability to convert new/emerging technology to a mass manufacturing method. The growth of market sectors and the addressable market size. The search for manufacturing methods that use less materials Manufacturing companies moving up the value chain in product development Applications already exist to create micronozzles, micro pumps, micro-pillars, microwells, micro-channels, valves, housings etc. smaller than this 300µm scale, indeed even at the nanometre scale. The largest applications for microinjection moulding is in MEMS sensors and microfluidic devices The development of microsystems is driving a global trend towards miniaturization, which in turn is creating a huge market for micro components that have micro/nano scale features, such as MEMS, microfluidic devices (these have wide applications in chemical, biological and medical diagnostics), and medical devices (ranging from micro-sensors to lab-on-chip technology). Currently, microinjection moulding is being used commercially to fabricate devices and components with a minimum feature size of typically 300µm.

7 Markets 3.1 Medical devices: Microfluidics The global microfluidics market in 2009 was estimated at $2.1 billion, growing at 13.5% p.a. Polymer is and will remain the main substrate for microfluidic applications, and the market size for plastic microfluidics alone is forecast to be worth $2.5 billion by 2016, and clinical point-of-care diagnostics will account for 75% of this, disposable microfluidic Lab-on-Chip (LoC) devices needed for such diagnostic applications. Examples of microfluidic devices are for DNA/protein separation and single DNA molecular manipulation as they exhibit a series of micro-scale channels with integrated sub-micron and nanometre scale features. Producing such components and systems requires integrating manufacturing processes across the length scales from 10-2 to 10-7 m. Most of these devices are fabricated using silicon or glass so as to take advantage of welldeveloped patterning technologies. To develop future applications and markets for microfluidic technologies, such as clinical, veterinary, and point-of-care diagnostics, and both public health and environmental monitoring, will require large volumes of inexpensive product. This will only be achieved using mass production methods. For a variety of reasons, including cost and material properties (e.g., optical, biocompatibility, good electrical insulation and excellent replication fidelity), polymers are gradually replacing silicon and glass for the fabrication of microfluidic devices As the devices will be used for rapid diagnosis on-site at, for example, a general medical practise, they will need to be mass-produced and of an inexpensive material: they will be of injection moulded polymer. There is therefore a need to develop durable tooling in which to mould such polymer micro-bio-chips invested with the fine features available via lithography to silicon and glass. Other applications for moulded components with surface features down to 10-5 m in size include microlens arrays for LED illumination and micro-gears. 7 In life science applications, moulded Lab on Chip devices will be required with surface features of detail finer than the 10-5 m representative of a red blood cell. Figure 2: Prototype Lab-on-chip device with multiscale features for DNA/cell separation, supplied by UCD. 3.2 Other Markets

8 There are a number of other markets where mass miniaturisation of polymer parts is expected to be impacted by µinjection moulding. These are in; Medical: Growing demand for small sized components mainly from the medical industry is expected to be a key driving factor. µinjection moulding is used to manufacture highly valued micro medical components such as sensors, implants, tubes, catheter tips and micro optics among some other components; the growing demand for these has had a positive impact on the market. Currently medical grade polymers cost up to 20x the cost of non medical grade polymer, so both additional features and the use of less materials can give companies very strong competitive advantages. Medical and healthcare emerged as the leading application markets for microinjection moulding and accounted for just over one-third of the total market in Along with being the largest market, these are also expected to be the fastest growing market for microinjection moulding at an estimated CAGR of 15.2% from 2013 to Growing demand for small sized components on account of increasing number of minimally invasive surgeries is expected to drive the market over the next six years. Other sectors include hearing aids, where micro injection moulding can have a positive impact. The global market for hearing aid devices was $6.6 billion in Micro-optics manufacturing is valued at $408 M in 2012, It is growing at 5% per annum. While fibre optics application is expected to exceed USD $95 million by , Future trends towards adoption of micro moulding over micromachining, owing to its cost efficiency and development of micro optics will accelerate as µinjection moulding enters the mainstream market. Consolidation is occurring in the market e.g. Oclaro Signs Definitive Agreement to Sell Amplifier & Micro-Optics Business for $88.6 million. 9 Automotive Electronics:. Micro moulding is used for manufacturing micro switches, ABS sensors connectors and airbag sensors in the automotive industry. It is expected to grow at an estimated CAGR of nearly 14% from 2013 to Global thermoplastic micro moulding demand from drive systems and control is expected to reach over USD 89 million by Automotive sectors include; Connectors

9 Bearing Retainer Cages and Seals Stators Stator Bobbins Encapsulated Sensor Components Hazard Buttons In-dash Components 3.3 SWOT Analysis Strength European SME leading in advanced injection moulding in areas as diverse as watchmaking to medical devices Technology uses less materials saving costs Weakness Lack of Industry knowledge about BMG Lack of expertise is in mass manufacturing polymer micro parts Skill shortage in industry Asia Pacific is expected to grow at a CAGR of 14.9% from 2013 to 2020 North America emerged as the leading market for microinjection polymer moulding, accounting for more than 40% of the total market in The global market for microinjection polymer moulding in automotive industry is expected to exceed USD 200 million by Opportunities Rapid growth in Microfluidics market Growing interest globally and nationally Push for disposable lower cost microfluidics Nano Features are desirable Threat Resistance to displacement of existing technology Existing technology perceived as good enough Overseas competitors develop IP faster and patent block/protect areas. Figure 3: 5 year growth market of microfluidic, year 1 = Take Home Message European market for micro injection moulding is expected to grow at a CAGR of 13.8% from 2013 to Asia Pacific is still a large untapped market and hold immense opportunities in the years to come.

10 4.0 Research and Next Generation Production 4.1 Materials for Manufacture Micro-injection moulding can be used to manufacture polymer components with complex shapes and high quality surface features, similarly to conventional injection moulding. 4.2 Tooling Overview The current generation of microfluidic devices have channel dimensions in the tens to hundreds of mm range. The requisite mould tool materials need to be amenable to being micro-machined to produce such patterns in negative, and must be resilient i.e. resistant to wear or other forms of surface or structural degradation, including those relating to thermal fatigue, over several thousands of moulding cycles. However, tool steel the workhorse of traditional injection mould tool is finding its limits in terms of minimum feature size as the number of microns in the scale becomes small [MRS Proc.]. This is due to the polycrystalline nature of tool steel, where even in the fine-grained alloys when the size of the surface feature gets down to the grain size then grain boundary and crystallographic misorientation effects start to interfere with the desired surface pattern. However the demands on tooling materials are ever-increasing as the need to produce and replicate patterns of ever-increasing resolution emerges. In the Lab on Chip life science applications this is due to the incorporation of features representative of cell (10-5 m), bacterium (10-6 m) and even virus (10-7 m) into microfluidic chips. Current leading technology is based on tool steel. Although designed for durability, tool steel cannot be patterned to the requisite sub-micron resolution due to limitations relating to its finite grain size. Engineers have been looking for alternative mould tool materials due to the limitations of the existing candidates, and bulk metallic glasses are attractive in that they can be patterned with features of sub-micron size, they are durable and wear-resistant, and they can be fabricated in bulk form i.e. with section sizes 10-3 to Figure 4: Micron featuring on tool steel

11 Figure 5: Micron Featuring on BMG material The next generation of microfluidic devices thus have to be patterned with sub-micron features yet their overall dimensions must be those of industry standards [SEMI MS Specification for High Density Permanent Connections Between Microfluidic Devices, SEMI Global Headquarters, San Jose, CA] established to assist interconnection and performance for microfluidic interfaces and to enable low cost and high volume manufacturing of products. A typical standard microfluidic chip will be of credit card size i.e. a few cm 2. What is needed then, is multiscale tooling for moulding new LoC components. Current and future options include; 1. Crystalline Tool Inserts 2. Non Crystalline Metals; Bulk Metallic Glass 3. Nickel Inserts 4.3 Bulk Metallic Glass From an industry fore-sighting perspective, BMG have been identified as an enabling technology to allow companies to develop new mass moulded products with sub-micron features. BMG are a class of metallic alloys, which resist crystallization even at low cooling rates, they were discovered in the mid-to-late 1980s. 11 An amorphous metal (also known metallic glass or glassy metal) is a solid metallic material, usually an alloy, with a disordered atomic-scale structure. Most metals are crystalline in their solid state, which means they have a highly ordered arrangement of atoms. Amorphous metals are non-crystalline, and have a glass-like structure. There are several ways in which amorphous metals can be produced, including extremely rapid cooling, physical vapour deposition, solid-state reaction, ion irradiation, and mechanical alloying. These bulk amorphous metals or bulk metallic glasses (BMGs), implying that all dimensions of the cast sample are >> 1 mm. Many alloy families and processing methods have been developed since their discovery. BMGs have

12 combined properties, including high compressive strength, large elastic limit and excellent corrosion resistance, which markedly differentiate them from crystalline metals processing steps, while reducing processing time. Direct machining of features onto bulk metallic glass is the most direct means of manufacturing a multi-scale tool. This can be done by various methods such as, wire-edm, electrochemical micromachining, laser cutting, Focused Ion Beam (FIB) machining. Figure 6: Patterning on BMG and on polymer 4.4 Characteristics of Microfluidic Market Drivers and why companies are interested in BMG 1. Consistency and repeatability is a key concern for medical components. Implantable devices should adhere to strict dimensions and tolerances each time they are produced. 2. Cost Savings; in certain industries, nickel electroform tooling can cost 80,000. BMG mould requires less expensive equipment and using fewer

13 APPENDIX Appendix 1: Manufacturing Tooling Technologies for microinjections Technology Competitive advantages of technology Bulk Metallic Glass Strength REFERNECES: Disadvantages 1 ( electrodes-for-new-medical-devices-reach-9-5-billion-in- Small 2022.html/). number of commercial materials Durability >30,000 cycles Some Source: BMG suppliers Lux Research use toxic Ref; materials A single-crystal silicon Widely known processing material Not suitable tool material due to brittleness (K Ic 1MPa m) wafer patterned by and methods (e.g. in DRIE for cuts-medical-plastics-waste Haeberle S and Zengerle R 2007 Microfluidic platforms for labon-a-chip reactive-ion etching making MEMS) applications Lab. Chip Cannon D M, Flachsbart B R, Shannon M A, Sweedler J V and SU-8 on silicon Used for casting PDMS (i) Bohn P the W 2004 SU-8 Fabrication features tend of single to delaminate nanofluidic from the silicon channels in poly(methylmethacrylate) films via focused-ion beam milling substrate for use under as repeated molecular use gates Appl. Phys. Lett. 85 (ii) The brittle silicon substrate tends to fracture. Abgrall P and Gu e A-M 2007 Lab-on-chip technologies: making Electroformed metallic Good dimensional precision and (i) a microfluidic Slow and network time consuming and coupling to prepare; it into a tools (e.g. Nickel) surface finish complete microsystem a review J. Micromech. Microeng. 17 (ii) Needs special surface treatment on master prior to Nan Zhang, electroforming Gilchrist Towards nano-injection MAY 2012 VOLUME 15 (iii) Is flimsy and has an uneven back-side NUMBER 5 (iv) Difficult to produce high-aspect-ratio tools using this Micro-machined metallic tools. Good stiffness, strength, toughness and wear resistance Low Cost J.C. Huang, process (2009) Sensors & Actuators A 150 pp ]. (v) Electroformed features often fail by delamination [D. Wang, G. Liao, J. Pan, Z. Tang, P. Peng, L. Liu and T. Shi from the substrate. (2009) J Alloys Cmpds 484 pp ]. (i) Limited by crystalline size of metal. (ii) Only accurately producing features which are 50 μm 8 "Polymer and and larger. Thermoplastic Micro Molding Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends and Forecast to (iii) Process usually leaves machining marks and burrs 2019" Research and Market 9 (poor surface finish) agreement-to-sell-amplifier-micro-optics-business-to-ii-vi- incorporated-for-886-million microinjection-molding-market-to-2020-industry-trends- market-size-segments-growth-prospects htm 11 Klement, W.; Willens, R. H.; Duwez, POL (1960). "Noncrystalline Structure in Solidified Gold-Silicon Alloys". Nature 187 (4740):

14 ABOUT KARIM KARIM is the Knowledge Acceleration and Responsible Innovation Meta-network, it aims at facilitating knowledge transfer across North West Europe (NWE), in 6 main fields: ICT (Information & Communication Technologies) Smart Energy Systems Environmental Technologies Eco-toxicology Nano-bio Science & engineering Bio-medical Technologies to modify existing, regionally-based support to enable transnational access and piloting of actions building on established best-practice from two or more regions. The strategic aim of the project is influence policy at all levels and increase investment in transnational innovation support and technology transfer.the project is a proposed strategic initiative, responding to the call for a NWE Knowledge transfer network under INTERREG IV B. Europe s future economic growth will have to come from innovation in products, services and business models; we need to be better at turning research into new and better services and products if we are to remain competitive in the global marketplace and improve the quality of life in Europe. KARIM will enable to meet this goal. We are committed to sharing innovation and improving small and medium sized enterprises access to high value innovation support and technology in order to make NWE more competitive. The KARIM project will be delivered by a consortium drawn from universities, innovation support agencies, regional and national agencies and, crucially, business representative organisations. By 2014 the project will have created a strategic network of more than 500 innovation actors and will provide a range of innovative yet practical offerings for all who share the vision of creating a more competitive Europe. KARIM programme is implemented through 17 actions. These actions will create transnational support for innovation and technology transfer; provide SMEs access to a wider range of high quality technologies and innovation support than available locally; increase capacity of SMEs and universities to access and provide support transnationally; and reduce regional disparities in SME access to innovation support and technology. Actions will demonstrate the value of the network in improving SME competitiveness; change existing infrastructures to sustain transnational access by SMEs; and lead increased adoption of the approach at all policy levels. Funding will be used