Graphene Industry to cross $10 Billion in the next decade: Vikas Bardiya, Founder, Nanomatrix Materials

Share a brief about Nanomatrix Materials. How did it come into existence?
Nanomatrix Materials is a Jaipur-based start-up, which manufactures graphene, a wonder material that has its significant place in the world of Nano material Science. Nanomatrix Materials is one the firsts which specializes in integration of graphene into a number of applications and value-added propositions.

Our team has expertise in digging deeper into the subject. When we started working in the Graphite space, we had followed the wonders of graphene since the beginning. It took years of knowledge and expertise which includes expertise from US and EU to finally come up to a solution for sustainable and scaling up of graphene manufacturing.
 
What kind of Graphene based applications are developed by Nanomatrix and what is in the pipeline?
Nanomatrix Materials has developed a number of advanced nano material solutions for different applications. One such product the company came up with is NMG–Tx, a Patented Graphene-Silver Technology which is strongly anti-viral and anti-bacterial. The membranes developed by using this nano composite can be used in face masks including non-surgical face masks & N95 face masks. Most available Non-surgical face masks stop the virus, but by using NM Membranes in the non-surgical face mask as one of the layers can, not only stop, but also destroys viruses instantly. These membranes can also be used in air filtration. The nano composite can also be applied on any kind of textile making the entire attire anti-microbial.

What are the unique properties of this wonder material and how they are becoming a part of our daily lives?
Graphene the 2D, single layered Carbon material is being used in almost every industry from manufacturing of aeroplanes to making medical equipment, batteries to garments. Beauty of this material is that it can be functionalized into number of ways. For eg. Graphene can be modified to either conductive or non-conductive, good or bad insulator etc.

There are number of use cases which are being worked upon across the globe and some companies have even come up with the end use product for consumers for eg. Graphene based batteries, coatings etc. Work has been ongoing where graphene is used as additives which includes consumer electronic, sensors, water filtration, textile, rubber and tyres, polymers, oil and many more.

Graphene is the strongest known material till date, thinnest, lighter, has high electron mobility at room temperature and is highly flexible. Due to these properties this wonder material is becoming part of our daily life.

During this pandemic, the major concern is the safety of oneself thus, keeping in mind the strong anti-microbial activity of Graphene researchers have come up with the solution of incorporating Graphene into the medical equipment such as masks, gloves and gowns. The coating of Graphene in these would limit the virus transmission danger by killing the virus 99% in a matter of seconds.

A virtue of graphene is that when combined with different elements, it serves multiple purposes. For instance, a unique combination of graphene and silver reduces killing time of microbes significantly. On its own, if silver kills microbes in two hours, with graphene it’s done within seconds.

Are you funded? What is your business model?
NM Materials is backed by Bardiya Group, which is chaired by Mr. Rajendra K. Bardiya, a visionary, dynamic businessman under whom the group had endeavoured into a global attuned business house which endeavours in the sector of Real Estate, Hospitality and Graphite. The group is 4 decades old and with Nanomatrix Materials, it is committed towards delivering a superior range of graphene based advanced materials and application for various industries.
Nanomatrix Materials (NM) is the R&D and B2B arm of the group which specializes into manufacturing of Graphene and integration of Graphene into further value-added applications.

G1 Wonders is the Consumer products wing (B2C) of the group which shall have its presence in online as well as brick & mortar retail space. G1 Wonders has number of consumer products (B2C) lined up for future shall be revealed and launched from time to time. All these products shall have Graphene as the key material in them which enhances the functionality and experience of the product.
 
What kind of opportunities and challenges are there in the market?
Graphene technology is at a nascent stage of development in the world. It is highly sophisticated technology which requires special expertise. There is a significant return in the garment industry like sportswear and the very latest face mask in pandemic, footwear industries, tyre manufacturing, and batteries.  A decade back the Graphene industry was less than $10 Million, now it is over $150 Mn industry and we believe it would be over $10 Billion industry in the next decade.

Current challenges -
Lack of/ slow response rate of Government institutes / laboratories for the testing.
Creating the awareness of Graphene and its properties to the general public.  
 
What are your expansion plans?
Under NM, being the R&D and B2B arm of the group, we collaborate with companies which are into industrial domains like filtration, textile, polymers, energy etc. We aim to create products which have extraordinary properties in them using Graphene.

At G1 Wonders which is the B2C wing, we plan to expand our portfolio which could be the resultant of the R&D and invention of Nanomatrix for example G1 Masks. These operations shall be done in Jaipur and Bengaluru.
 
Product – G1 Wonders is launching the consumer product channel with the G1 Wonder mask, World’s first range of surgical and non-surgical face mask, which has CORONA killing Graphene-Silver nanotechnology & is highly breathable, comfortable & the users can wear it for longer hours without any discomfort. G1 Wonder mask is washable & reusable up to 30 gentle washes.
Price – Rs 299/- aggressive pricing - affordable to all

Promotion – Along with the traditional media, a comprehensive 360° marketing mix has been put in place including digital/social media & celebrity endorsements, fitness/promotional apps & brand integration with various events, social causes & awareness campaigns.

People – To curb the pandemic & its ever increasing spread, every Indian from all walks of life, especially the working professional, students, health & sanitation workers, government employees and the elderly are our target consumers.

Process – G1 wonder masks will be available on company's website & we are also partnering with Amazon, Flipkart & 1Mg to start with. We will be also moving into the brick & mortar retail space in the coming days across the tier 1 and 2 cities of India.
 
What are the learnings you have had since inception of the brand?
We have seen many phases before and after the inception of Nanomatrix. Working with such sophisticated technology, require extremely high precision and calibration. We have to be prepared for 100 of sample testing and same number of failures, but the most important part is to learn from the mistakes and narrowing down the error margin keeping in mind what you want to create or what the end user requires.

Another major learning is that to get the best one really cannot rely on single supply chain and institute, instead need to consider multiple and most effective options.