Cambridge Display Technology Ltd has been promising great things in displays for several years now, but it is finally coming down to the wire and has signed former IBM UK Ltd business Xyratex Ltd to take its patented Light-Emitting Polymer technology, seen as a replacement for cathode ray tubes in televisions and personal computers, out of the laboratory and into the market. The agreement will initially enable Cambridge Display to scale up its technology to production level and begin to embed it in consumer applications currently using light-emitting diodes or liquid crystal displays, such as mobile phones and Personal Digital Assistants. Havant, UK-based Xyratex will provide manufacturing expertise, and the two are working on details of a manufacturing facility. A pilot plant is seen for the end of 1997, followed by a full scale manufacturing production line. 000. Cambridge Display has been looking for funding for some time to continue development of the technology. At the end of 1995, it launched a campaign to raise 4m British pounds in a first stage venture capital funding. Following the launch of the manufacturing pilot in 1997, the company is planning to raise more cash in a flotation. The company boasts an impressive list of early investors, including the rock group Genesis, the computer industry’s Sculley brothers and Cambridge luminary and founding director of Acorn Computer Group Plc Hermann Hauser, to name but a few. Funding has also come from six Cambridge University colleges. The company currently has just 16 staff, but forecasts that it will employ at least 75 by the year 2000, when it looks for turnover of $100m.
