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History
2024
The arrest of the ex-head of the company
Former head of Plastic Logic Boris Galkin was arrested in the case of embezzlement of funds allocated by Rusnano Corporation. This became known on August 28, 2024. Read more here.
Closing the company
On August 15, 2024, the City Arbitration Court Moscow terminated proceedings on the application Rusnano for declaring Plastic Logic LLC bankrupt. The company, which received 7.1 billion from for development rubles , states ceased to exist.
Plastic Logic is a project of Anatoly Chubais to produce tablets equipped with a flexible plastic display. It was assumed that such gadgets would replace textbooks for Russian schoolchildren. It was planned to build an enterprise for the production of these devices in Zelenograd: the creation of the plant was estimated at 700 million rubles. However, the project was never implemented. In an interview with TASS, Chubais said in 2018 that by refusing to build a plant for the production of flexible electronics, Rusnano prevented losses.
After the start of the special operation, Chubais left Russia. In early February 2024, Rusnano initiated the bankruptcy of Plastic Logic LLC and transferred the inspection materials of this company to law enforcement agencies. As part of the bankruptcy procedure, Rusnano hoped to receive the remnants of the property and intellectual property of Plastic Logic, but the court did not satisfy the request because the company closed.
As follows from the extract from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, the Plastic Logic company ceased operations on May 15, 2024. In accordance with paragraph 9 of Article 63 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation, the liquidation of a legal entity is considered completed, and the legal entity is considered to have ceased to exist after entering information about its termination into the unified state register of legal entities in the manner prescribed by law. At the time of completion of the liquidation of a legal entity, its legal capacity ceases - the ability to have civil rights corresponding to the purposes of its activities and to bear civil obligations related to this activity (paragraph 3 of Article 49 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation). On this basis, the proceedings on the application of Rusnano to declare Plastic Logic LLC bankrupt were terminated.[1]
2015: Take and Share: Rusnano to split Plastic Logic
On March 11, 2015, the Board of Directors of the Rusnano management company decided to divide the project for creating flexible screens based on the Irish company Plastic Logic into two parts - the production[2] of[2].
More than 12 billion rubles allocated four years ago did not help Rusnano start production. According to Yury Udaltsov, deputy chairman of the board of Rusnano Management Company, after the reorganization of the project, the production part will focus on the basis of the German Plastic Logic Germany, which operates a plant in Dresden, and the research part will focus on the basis of the British Flexenable, which operates on the basis of the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge. Control over both companies will be concentrated in the hands of Rusnano.
Rusnano became a co-owner of Irish Plastic Logic Holding in 2011. The company has developed a project for the production of readers with monochrome flexible screens made of special plastic, and Rusnano decided to establish their mass production in Zelenograd, investing 7.13 billion rubles in the project. (the total budget was 12.62 billion rubles). As of October 2011, Rusnano's share in Plastic Logic was 43.84%.
There were no reports of the start of production. The Electronic State Expert Center, citing an informed source[3]: "there were construction wagons at the construction site for some time, and that's it."
A possible reason for abandoning production is a lack of profitability. Flexible displays were supposed to be supplied for readers, but they came out more expensive than ordinary ones and were short-lived due to the rapidly oxidizing organics used in displays. The electronic textbook Plastic Logic 100, in August 2011, was presented by the head of RusnanoAnatoly Chubais to Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
Chairman of the Board of Rusnano Anatoly Chubais demonstrates the product, 2011
The device was included in the experimental program for testing electronic textbooks in several regions of Russia, despite a number of claims:
- monochromaticism
- high price (12 thousand rubles),
- reduced functionality:
- no additional content can be downloaded
- install third-party applications
- does not know how to work with multimedia files.
In 2012, Plastic Logic announced a change of strategy: not to produce flexible readers, but plastic displays and other components of plastic electronics.
Now, according to Vedomosti, Rusnano will bring its stake in Plastic Logic Germany to 100% - permission from the Federal Antimonopoly Service to buy 100% of its parent company, the Russian Plastic Lodge CJSC, was received in mid-February.
As for the British Flexenable, Rusnano considers this company as a technology startup and will look for venture investors for it. Rusnano will receive about 80% of Flexenable, said a source close to Plastic Logic. The rest will be divided among themselves by Rusnano's partners in the Irish Plastic Logic Holding in proportion to participation in its financing.
Yury Udaltsov reported that the Dresden factory had commercial orders and the first revenue appeared in 2015.
The company will focus on the production of displays for various practical devices - luggage tags, electronic labels, readers, phones and other portable devices, as well as for information boards and signs.
However, Rusnano does not abandon the idea of transferring plastic electronics technologies to Russia, says Udaltsov: the corporation is thinking of creating production of batches of prototypes here, but there is no final solution yet. According to the source of the Electronic State Expert Center, it is possible to build a plant in Troitsk. Regarding the sale of products, it is designed for "exotic" applications, for example: to embed displays in police uniforms.
2012: New Strategy
Plastic Logic introduced a new business strategy in the spring of 2012. It involves the refusal to form a full-cycle production holding focused on the production and promotion of one type of product - e-books. Instead, the company, using its expertise in producing flexible plastic displays, intends to focus on designing and manufacturing a wide range of solutions for existing and promising electronic devices. We are talking about both flexible and shock-resistant displays of various sizes that can replace traditional paper media, as well as completely new applications for plastic electronics. At the same time, it is planned to widely use licensing technology for the release of shock-resistant plastic displays and software for image control and optimization.
The final goods will be brought to market together with partners from among the contract manufacturers of microelectronic components, system integrators and device manufacturers. The company is currently in talks with a number of manufacturers, including technology licensing issues.
As part of the new strategy, the company will retain the R&D center in Cambridge and production facilities in Dresden. The division in USA charge of product development will be closed. The decision on the timing of the construction of the enterprise Russia will be made after determining the list and volumes of new products. In the meantime, it is planned to deploy a research center in the field of plastic electronics in Zelenograd.
The development of the company's new strategy began at the initiative of Plastic Logic CEO Indro Mukarji, who was appointed to this position in September 2011, and was supported by key investors - RUSNANO and Oak Investment Partners. It takes into account a significant breakthrough in the development of plastic electronics technology, which the company has made in the last year. In particular, Plastic Logic products for the first time in the world have the ability to display high-resolution color images.
At the same time, the life of displays exceeds 5 years and 10 million page updates, and the refresh rate of the screen when showing video animation, as well as the indicators of "good" reached the level of the LCD industry. Finally, on the basis of the world's first organic electronics plant, Plastic Logic in Dresden, mass production of devices with a durable, thin and light display with a diagonal of 10.7 'has been launched.
2011: Presentation to Putin
- At the beginning of 2011, Rusnano's investments in a project to produce "flexible displays" in Zelenograd using technology amounted to $150 million, and in addition to them, Rusnano provided the Russian subsidiary Plastic Logic, Plastic Logjik CJSC, with partial guarantees to secure a loan of $100 million. As a result of the investments made, the former state corporation, now transformed into OJSC, received a 25% stake in Plastic Logic.
At the same time, investors from Rusnano announced that the construction of the Moscow Region plant would begin in 2011, and the first "pilot" batches of products would appear in 2013-2014.
In addition to Rusnano, Oak Investment Partners, a venture capital fund, invested $50 million in the Zelenograd plant.
In the next few years, the project will need additional funding totaling up to $400 million. Thus, the total cost of the project should be about $700 million, which coincides with the size of the investment, which Anatoly Chubais named at a meeting with Putin in August 2011.
- On August 18, 2011, Anatoly Chubais, at a meeting with Vladimir Putin, presented to the Prime Minister a tablet computer "capable of replacing the entire set of textbooks in all disciplines." The lightweight and vandal-resistant tablet is based on the technology of "non-silicon electronics," its price will be about 12 thousand rubles.
The most famous success of this technological direction is the release of "flexible displays" using "electronic paper" technology. It is also used in the device shown by the head of Rusnano to the head of the Russian government.
Interestingly, Anatoly Chubais spoke of the tablet as the development of his own company. "Our device uses well-known electronic paper technology," he writes in his blog, adding that "we have prepared an experimental batch - a thousand pieces." In the new academic year, this batch of experimental "tablets" will go to schools, and, according to the head of Rusnano, the experiment already has the support of the Ministry of Education.
Meanwhile, sources in Rusnano confirmed to CNews that the device shown by Anatoly Chubais to Putin is a tablet developed by Plastic Logic, one of the leaders of non-silicon electronics, which seeks to enter the consumer market since 2008.
Representatives of Rusnano did not specify the technical characteristics of the tablets from the experimental batch intended for testing in Russian schools, so it is impossible to establish with accuracy whether the QUE proReader was shown to Putin or the new Plastic Logic development. However, it is worth noting that after refusing to bring QUE proReader to the market, Plastic Logic did not report new models.
2010: Russian investors represented by Rusnano
- In early 2010, the following iteration of the "plastic tablet" was presented, which was called the "business e-book" QUE proReader, had Wi-Fi and 3G modules and 4 or 8 GB of solid-state memory. Plastic Logic announced that the device will appear in American retail at a price of $650 in the minimum configuration, and for $800 in the version with 8 GB of memory and a 3G module.
- In August 2010, after several launch postponements, Plastic Logic abandoned the idea of bringing QUE proReader to market. Nevertheless, the company in Dresden has a production line capable of pilot production of tablets with a capacity of about 1 thousand units per week.
- In December 2010, agreements were officially announced on the acquisition by the Russian state corporation Rusnano of a stake in Plastic Logic and the construction of a flexible display plant based on the company's technologies in the Zelenograd special economic zone. Thus, the Zelenograd factory Plastic Logic will become the second production site of the company producing "flexible displays."
2008: First Devices
In September 2008, for the first time, devices based on a "flexible plastic display" were announced by the British Plastic Logic under the name Plastic Logic Reader. Then they already had a wireless interface and supported working with files in MS Office formats.
Notes
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