Challenge

When graphene is combined with other materials, it offers the ability to disrupt and challenge industrial convention and established practices. The sports equipment sector offers one of the most prominent opportunities to challenge the consensus of the established sports brands and manufacturers. Graphene also offers up the ability to question how sports products are: imagined, designed and produced.

Since its discovery in 2003, engineers and scientists initially struggled with the supply and cost of graphene. Entrepreneurs and visionaries were previously frustrated with the lack of facilities preventing their vision from becoming reality. However, with recent developments at the Manchester National Graphene Institute and the creation and launch of its hub, the Graphene Engineering and Innovation Centre (GEIC), the barriers of entry have now been lowered. 

The price of graphene in its raw form has fallen significantly over the past two years as suppliers have refined their processes and improved their delivery systems. The quality and price now allows comprehensive testing to take place to ensure that the quality of any finished projects is not compromised. 

The reduction in price has also allowed manufactured products to come to market at highly competitive prices. For example; the  Nanoventive ZEMPI shin-pad, a highly engineered, elite-level form of protection, will retail at circa €40 per pair, coming in considerably less than other elite pads in the market which can retail at €100. 

The team Nanoventive has worked with at Graphene Enabled, has developed a compound which is now ready for testing as a shin-pad prototype. The GEIC has put in place the equipment to enable the production of the prototypes and the ability to cope with significant production runs in the thousands. 

The investment required for the state-of-the-art equipment needed to produce prototypes and finished products ready to market, would have proven to be an impossible hurdle to overcome for Nanoventive. However, with the multi million pounds investment in equipment at the GEIC, that barrier to entry is no longer present. With the assistance of the engineering excellence at the GEIC, combined with the full support of the National  Graphene Institute, there is no challenge Nanoventive can’t take on and overcome.