Strategic Elements reveals short-term venture goals

Australian ‘venture builder’ Strategic Elements (ASX: SOR) has outlined its development pathway for the remainder of 2020 after a recent $5.1 million capital raising provided the boost needed to fast-track plans.

The pooled development fund advised the market of its short-term goals, which includes scaling up fabrication of a printable battery ink, testing the neuromorphic computing potential of its Nanocube Memory ink cells, and expanding on its autonomous security vehicle and autonomous robotics platform collaborations.

In addition to these objectives, Strategic Elements said it will also seek “further acquisitions in Australian innovation”.

Today’s announcement provides clarification on the company’s timeline following a steady stream of recent news including a new collaboration between its subsidiary Australian Advanced Materials, the University of New South Wales and the CSIRO to develop self-charging ink battery cells, an achievement relating to its subsidiary Stealth Technologies’ autonomous security vehicle agreement with US-based Honeywell, and Stealth’s new partnership to develop an automated weed detection and management device.

The fund also closed an oversubscribed share purchase plan, accepting $5.1 million of the $6.8 million in received applications. The funds are intended to “dramatically accelerate development in current projects and to seek further acquisitions”.

Strategic Elements managing director Charles Murphy today said the top priority is the collaboration with Honeywell, given the autonomous security vehicle’s “very large market opportunity in the perimeter security sector”.

“The whole company has been working incredibly hard for quite some time to ensure we progress forward. With the recent capital raising, we will be able escalate again,” he added.

Autonomous robotics platform

Strategic Elements’ subsidiary Stealth has an exclusive collaboration with software industrial and Fortune 100 company Honeywell to build autonomous security vehicles for the correctional justice sector.

In mid-October, the company announced its vehicle has passed user acceptance testing, paving the way for it to be deployed at the Eastern Goldfields Regional Prison in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia.

“The collaboration with Honeywell remains our priority and to pass user acceptance testing recently was a great achievement for the development team,” Mr Murphy said.

“The autonomous security vehicle has a very large market opportunity in the perimeter security sector, which is experiencing rapid growth in the face of COVID-19 and increasing government regulations,” he added.

According to the company, the global perimeter security market is forecast to be growing at a compound annual rate of 12% and is predicted to reach US$282.26 billion (A$402.37 billion) by 2025.

In today’s announcement, Strategic Elements said its near-term objectives include partnering with other companies and research groups to integrate their advanced technologies with its AxV autonomous robotics platform.

It also plans to launch an early adopter program this month for the autonomous security vehicle in non-correctional sectors such as mining and transport.

“Stealth is seeking to work closely with early adopters to deeply understand their use case, solve their problems and continuously upgrade and improve the ASV,” Strategic Elements stated.

Printable memory technology

Stealth is also developing ultra-low power flexible circuits to operate Nanocube Memory Ink cells, which would enable smaller memory cells and a larger density of memory arrays to operate on a flexible device.

The circuits are fabricated with a printable ink containing ‘nanowires’ which have diameters 100 times smaller than human hair.

In today’s announcement, Strategic Elements said it will test the Nanocube Memory for its potential in flexible, transparent ‘brain-inspired’ (neuromorphic) computing.

A series of significant synaptic functions are expected to be emulated, with results anticipated in December.

Self-charging battery technology

Last week, Australian Advance Materials announced it will scale up fabrication of a printable battery ink to 1 litre within the next four weeks.

According to Strategic Elements, this would provide enough capacity to print more than 1,000 self-charging battery cells.

Results are expected to be available this month.