Shin-Etsu Chemical Co., Ltd. (Head Office: Tokyo; President: Yasuhiko Saitoh) has developed innovative electrophysiological dry electrodes and high-elasticity wiring materials, which will be used...

Contributing to the realization of a society in which people will lead healthier and longer lives Shin-Etsu Chemical Co., Ltd. (Head Office: Tokyo; President: Yasuhiko Saitoh) has developed innovative electrophysiological dry electrodes and high-elasticity wiring materials, which will be used to contribute to the achievement of superior performance characteristics for next-generation wearable devices. These wearable […]

The post Press Release: Shin-Etsu Chemical develops innovative new materials for wearable devices appeared first on Shin-Etsu MicroSi.

I am traveling for the last time this year and when I am on the road I get to reflect a lot on what is actually going on within supply chains and what we can expect into the future.  Here are some things I have reflected on and believe for 2022:

Disruption is not Going Away:

Short of a major economic turndown, the container issues, ship issues, port issues, driver and transportation issues all will continue through 2022 and into 2023.  There is no evidence that until significant ship and container capacity comes on line (2023) there will be much improvement.  As we have learned this last few weeks, the “appearance” of improvement has been somewhat of a mirage.  Ships are slowing down and they are at anchor just further out at sea.  

COVID Is Moving from a Pandemic to an Endemic:

The definition of an endemic is something that is around us and never going away.  Covid will be around us, at a baseline level for the foreseeable future.  The next time you hear someone say to you, “When this is over… “ , remind them we are going into our 3d year. This is the “way it is” and masks, vaccines and therapeutics will be needed likely for the remainder of my life.  Supply chains cannot “wait until this is over “  to implement change and execute process improvements.  We have to learn to work within it. 

Shippers Will Continue To Take More Control of The Assets:

We all have seen the stories of big companies leasing ships but who would have thought a large furniture company would buy a large trucking company?  This is a perfect example where shippers will be adjusting their supply chains to deal with the massive margin inflation in purchasing of supply chain services.  It takes a while but supply chains will adjust.  Product will be on-shored, assets will be insourced, and networks will be redesigned to adjust and mitigate the inflation.  

This was started by Amazon when they bought Kiva Robots and they have progressively taken control of their own destiny.  Amazon will surpass UPS and FEDEX as the largest package shipper (on their own assets) sometime next year.  The massive margin inflation passed to shippers this year is not sustainable and it will end. 

We Will See 3 Interest Rate Hikes in 2022:

This is breaking news as it was today the Fed had their press conference after the December FOMC meeting.  You decide what this means for your business but suffice to say the “punch bowl” is going to be removed from this economy.  I personally believe this will mean a number of “zombie” companies will struggle to survive.  The easy money will be gone and companies which generate no profit will not continue to be valued at such high levels as they are today.  

A Few Charts:

Those who know me know I track the FRED Inventory to Sales ratios as an indicator telling us what stage the restocking and the “normalization” of supply chain is in.  The news is that we are still dramatically lower than we need to be and this means restocking will continue for the foreseeable future (See Disruption is Not Going Away above):

I am traveling for the last time this year and when I am on the road I get to reflect a lot on what...

While major steel producers are investing millions to increase electrical steel production capacity, the rapid growth of the hybrid and electric vehicle segment could potentially cause material demand to outpace supply from 2025.

As the automotive industry battles the semiconductor shortages, which have prevented the production of 9.3 million units to date, the rapid expansion in growth of EV sales raises questions about the future availability of sufficient electrical steel needed to produce electric motors to meet the electrification targets set by regulators and OEMs around the globe.

Several major steel producers have announced investments in new xEV steel capacity over the next three to five years, but will this be sufficient to meet the specific grade and regional requirements of the xEV market?

What is electric steel? Why does it matter for automotive?

Electrical steel, or silicon steel, is an iron-silicon alloy that possesses superior magnetic properties to other types of steel alloys making it optimized for a variety of electrical machines ranging from power and distribution transformers to electric motors.

While electrical steel is estimated by IHS Markit to account for only 1% of the 2 billion metric ton 2020 global steel market, its supply is being considered as an increasingly critical input to OEMs' electrification plans as well as various energy transition initiatives. An important automotive application of electric steel in automotive is electric motors. These systems convert electrical energy into mechanical energy by energizing copper windings in a stator, which creates a magnetic field then causing the rotor to spin.

The commercial electrical steel market is divided in two major categories: grain-oriented electrical steel (GOES) market and the non-oriented electrical steel (NOES) market.

This distinction is fundamental to understand which type of electrical steel the automotive industry has an exposure and what mitigation strategies might be required. GOES is used in static machinery like transformers, which require unidirectional magnetization, while NOES is used in rotating machinery like motors and generators, which require multidirectional magnetization.

Applications for NOES are extensive and include consumer appliances (washing machines, dishwashers, etc.), heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) (including domestic refrigeration), automotive applications, small, medium, and large industrial motors, power generators, pumps etc. Because of the significantly higher volume of demand for rotating machinery, global NOES production in 2019 significantly exceeded the quantity of GOES produced that year.

Carmakers have a direct exposure to NOES, but they are indirectly also exposed to GOES.

• NOES is a direct material input used in electric motor manufacturing for both hybrid and electric vehicles, as well as in many low-power motor applications, ranging from high duty cycle motors like those used in electric power steering, oil, and fuel pumps to short time duty motors like those used for comfort and convenience like electric seat adjustment or sunroof. Some 35 to 45 low-power motors are fitted on average per car, with about 20 in the B segment and 80 in the E segment (with some extremes like the Mercedes S-class that has more than 100 motors).
  
  
• The critical difference between the different motor types is in the NOES grade being used. For reference, mild hybrid motors use less than USD10 of high-grade NOES, while battery-electric vehicles will use anywhere between USD60 to USD150 per motor of an extension of high-grade NOES, referred to as xEV grade, which in some configurations can even represent more than USD300 NOES content per vehicle, for example, when featuring individual traction motors on the front and rear axles to independently power the four wheels, like in the Rivian R1T. This xEV grade is where capacity constraint concerns are emerging.

While this article will focus on specific concerns around xEV-grade NOES, it should be noted that GOES is critical to support the rollout of much-needed EV charging infrastructure. OEMs therefore have in indirect exposure to this electrical steel subsegment also, meaning it is critical for the automotive industry to understand and manage their exposure to both categories of steel alloys. Many steel mills also employ common production equipment for GOES and NOES. This further compounds the risk owing to the increased difficulty in understanding producer capacity allocation strategies.

Is there an imminent shortage of xEV NOES for the auto sector? Why?

NOES capacity has been sufficient to satisfy the needs of the different industrial sectors over recent years, however increased demand from the automotive sector, in particular with OEMs' acceleration in their electrification drive, is likely to result in significant pressure for steel manufacturers to serve both the automotive sector and the other sectors that use this steel alloy from 2023 onward.

While in 2022, with some apprehension and assuming no other upstream and downstream disruption, we expect OEMs' orders being fulfilled. We foresee a structural capacity deficit to satisfy the automotive sector's requirements, which will require significant capital investment in the coming years.

Of the over 11 million tons of NOES produced in 2020, xEV-grade NOES accounted for a total of 456,000 tons, but as far as the automotive sector is concerned, this is by far the most critical.

There are different reasons why a capacity crunch for xEV-grade NOES might emerge.

• There is limited room for new entrants: Only 14 companies are currently capable of manufacturing xEV-grade NOES that meet global OEM requirements. More manufacturers may decide to enter this sector in the future, however major barriers to entry exist caused by capital expenditures associated with cold rolling, annealing, and coating equipment, manufacturing know-how, OEM-supplier relationships, and patent protection. OEMs are now able to purchase high-quality NOES from an increased (albeit still limited) number of high-volume electrical steel suppliers.
  
  
• Concentrated manufacturing footprint: Some 88% of the manufacturing is concentrated in Greater China, Japan, and South Korea and then exported to other regions usually in the form of steel coils. Supply is extremely limited in North America. There are only five mills globally that have a broad product offering that meaningfully covers the full spectrum of products and only one of them is located outside of Asia.
  
  
• Scope to change material or steel supplier is limited: Owing to the correlation between the efficiency of a motor and an EV's operating range, differences in core loss (a critical measure of the input electrical energy wasted as heat during magnetization) between competing NOES products suppliers can have significant impacts on OEM purchasing decisions, particularly for OEMs that purchase electrical steel laminations in high volumes.
  
  While OEMs and tier-1 traction motor manufacturers may have multiple mills on their approved sourcing list, most programs only have one PPAP approved steel mill. Material characteristics are also matter of litigation among suppliers.
  
  For example, in October 2021, Nippon Steel sued Toyota and Baoshan Iron and Steel (Baosteel), a subsidiary of the state-run China Baowu Steel Group, which is the largest steelmaker in the world. Nippon Steel claims the steel supplied by Baowu to Toyota for its hybrid motor cores violates its patents on composition, thickness, crystal grain diameter, and magnetic properties.
  
  
• Downstream processes also face bottlenecks: Aside from the limited number of steel manufacturers capable of producing xEV NOES, bottlenecks may emerge across the entire downstream motor supply chain. Not only are there only 20 motor core lamination stampers which can cater the OEMs' needs, but there are also only five companies that can produce these unique stamping presses and fewer than 10 independent tool shops with the competency to fabricate the unique stamping dies that can support state-of-the-art motor designs.
  
  Lead times for certain pieces of key production equipment have doubled over the last four years. Furthermore, not only are many of these companies small, family-owned businesses that have capital constraints limiting their ability to scale, a good portion of these have not traditionally significantly participated in the automotive industry.

How much xEV-grade NOES do OEMs need in the medium term? How big is the shortage?

The global gross demand for xEV-grade NOES required for the manufacturing of traction motors in hybrid and electric light vehicles is expected to grow from 320,000 tons demanded in 2020 to just over 2.5 million tons by 2027 and in excess of 4.0 million tons by 2033.

Based on capacity data from Metals Technology Consulting, a significant concern emerges around capacity constraints in 2023. It is highly unlikely mills can support market demand from 2025 onward without significant additional investments. However, adding capacity in 2025 requires mills to make decisions imminently. The situation looks even more dire when factoring in that most xEV-grade NOES mills can only sustain 90% capacity utilization over extended time periods.

Due to the exponential growth of electrified vehicles in the coming years, there remains a risk of electrical steel supply not meeting demand between 2023 and 2025. Despite projected capacity increases, a structural shortage of 61,000 tons is likely to occur in 2026. Without further major investments, this shortage could rise dramatically to 357,000 tons in 2027, culminating to a 927,000 tons shortage by 2030.

Which OEMs are more exposed?

The shortage is expected to particularly impact OEMs that are targeting a high share of hybrid and electrical models as part of their future product sales. Albeit battery electric vehicles (BEVs) manufacturers, particularly pure-play OEMs like Tesla are more exposed, there is also an exposure for OEMs wanting to hedge their electrification bets with a higher hybridization share in their mix, like Toyota for example. Additionally, the likes of Jaguar, Mini, Volvo, Mercedes-Benz and Alfa Romeo that intend to sell only plug-ins or EVs from 2025-30 onward, alongside larger OEMs like Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi and Volkswagen.

OEMs with a large share of vehicle builds in Europe also face serious headwinds as the supply-demand imbalance looks to be the most pronounced in that region, especially when factoring in cost competitiveness challenges resulting from tariffs on imported material.

Which region has the biggest gap?

Region-specific effects to OEMs will likely be directly driven by the production capabilities of domestic steel suppliers and the import tariffs in place in the region. In regions that are projected to demand significantly higher volumes compared with domestic supply, import tariffs can heavily affect operating expenses for OEMs that purchase motor cores at high volumes. For example, in the United States, Section 232 applies high duties, approaching 200%, on NOES imported from seven non-EU countries and quota-based tariffs on NOES imported from the EU.

Europe is the region with the highest supply imbalance, but to date, North America still has a major blind spot for NOES electrical steel production. Cleveland Cliffs (formerly AK Steel) is the only local producer of NOES. Cleveland Cliffs' NOES and GOES manufacturing shares common production equipment. Cleveland Cliffs is considerably focusing more on grain-oriented steel production to address the increasing regional demand for electrical transformers, thus reducing available xEV-grade NOES capacity.

The U.S. Steel-owned Big River Steel plant in Osceola, Arkansas, United States starts NOES production in the third quarter of 2023. This will bring 180,000 metric tons of NOES capacity per year online, 45,000 of which will likely be allocated to xEV-grade NOES.

Considering the aggressive vehicle electrification targets set by the Biden administration's infrastructure bill, the time required for Big River Steel to start xEV NOES production, and the further time required for it to ramp up production to full capacity, OEMs in the region will likely continue to face limited local supply options, driving up motor costs in the short term and hurting their international competitiveness.

Are steel manufacturers investing to fill that capacity gap? Can new players solve the situation?

Steel suppliers have announced multimillion-dollar investments to boost production of high-grade and xEV-grade NOES. However, even when accounting for these, there will still be an investment gap. For reference, the shortage of 650,000 metric tons by 2028 could require some 6 to 12 new mills (depending on size and location) to satisfy increased demand from the automotive sector.

Adding a new plant typically takes about three years for an existing player, with roughly one year for engineering and two years for construction. For a new player, it may take anywhere between two to eight years to produce high-grade NOES or xEV-grade NOES and to engineer and build the facility, on top of the initial three years.

What else could steel manufactures do to address the capacity constraint for autos?

The auto sector is a strategic growth area for steel manufacturers, particularly for special steel alloys, and is generally a major source of revenues. This could not paint a more different picture than what is evident in the semiconductor chip shortage. In this potential electrical steel shortage, the auto sector is more in the driver's seat than it has ever been in the chip shortage. The auto sector could benefit from the built-in flexibility that steel mills have. Most mills that manufacture electrical steel have cold mill designs. This allows critical pieces of equipment to be shared across low-grade NOES, high-grade NOES, and xEV-grade NOES. In several cases, mills also share equipment between xEV-grade NOES and GOES.

Mills were purposefully constructed in such fashion to allow for cost-effective mixed product manufacturing to mitigate risk in product mix changes. This results in a structure where mills can choose to allocate capacity based on market demand by product, product profitability, and contractual obligations with customers. However, changeovers to tweak the product mix could result in a capacity reduction of as much as 20%. The xEV-NOES grades that the auto sector needs are associated with higher profit margins.

Therefore, steel manufacturers will likely prioritize auto sector demand in the allocation of existing "swing capacities". This means that they will prioritize xEV-grade NOES over low-grade NOES. However, there is a potential risk that the blanket may be just too short, meaning that cutting high-grade NOES in favour of xEV-grade NOES could result in subsequent shortages of high-grade NOES. This is likely to cause downstream effects on the costs of the plethora of low-power motors used for auxiliary systems in a vehicle, as well as other industrial sectors.

Besides converting some capacity from other grades to xEV-grade capacity, steel manufacturers could also boost production by prioritizing the manufacturing of slightly thicker gauge sheets. Counterintuitively, using thinner steel sheets does not help expand production capacity. Techniques developed to improve magnetic characteristics at parity of thickness consume rolling capacity, which is a key constraint in production. For reference, 1 metric ton of double cold-reduced 0.25 mm xEV-grade NOES takes the same capacity as 2.5 metric tons of 0.35 mm xEV-grade NOES. There is, however, a major limit to using thicker sheets since it requires a painful redesign of motor cores to account for the decrease in motor efficiency and the resulting impact on the vehicle range.

Can't the OEMs or auto suppliers manufacture motors without NOES?

In short, axial flux motors are a design that uses GOES rather than NOES, but it's currently only applied in niche segments, particularly high-performance EVs, for example Ferrari LaFerrari was the first vehicle to feature an axial flux motor. Mercedes AMG is also going to feature this technology from 2025.

What does a mitigation strategy look like for OEMs?

In principle, the NOES shortage risk for the automotive industry can only be resolved through an overall increase in xEV-grade NOES production by steel manufacturers. However, OEMs, often in collaboration with major traction motor tier-1 suppliers, may pursue several mitigation strategies, including the use of alternative motor configurations and materials and greater vertical integration in the motor supply chain.

• Alternative motor configurations: A shortage risk of non-oriented electrical steel could be an opportunity to potentially energize traction motor innovation. For example, OEMs and tier-1 suppliers may try to change planar geometry of the rotors and stators to reduce planned design scrap material in the manufacturing process, which is typically anywhere between 30% to 45%, but in certain designs can be as high as 75%.
  
  
• Greater vertical integration: OEMs may seek to vertically integrate their motor supply chains and directly partner with steel manufacturers to better control their inputs. OEMs are keen to reduce their reliance on tier-1 suppliers for electric motors for various reasons, including the ability to now benefit from economies of scale with the higher volumes per platform, to retain in-house critical engineering skill, and to convert a portion of its workforce to this new value chain while internal combustion engine (ICE) manufacturing is being phased out.
  
  For example, General Motors (GM) recently announced an alliance with GE to create a regional supply chain for materials such as electrical steel. By partnering with steel manufacturers, automakers will be able to continuously push the operating range of their vehicles with optimized NOES grades for their needs.
  
  
• Thoughtful materials engineering and print specification development: OEMs that choose not to partner with steel mills may need to rethink how material specifications are developed. Today, that focus is principally around optimizing motor performance, not supply chain risk mitigation. This results in situations where OEMs can only purchase steel from one mill in the world because it is the only supplier that is capable.

Could this potential capacity crunch affect OEMs' electrification drive?

This potential shortage could severely affect OEMs' electrification plans if this is not addressed by adding more capacity and investment in new capacity. While measures such as "swing capacity" allocation (manufacturing capacity that can accommodate a broader product mix without major intervention to production line configuration or process), modifying motor core designs to reduce material usage, adopting different materials, and integrating supply chains can alleviate NOES supply chain risks for OEMs in the short term, increasing additional production capacity is the only measure to address the structural imbalance between capacity and the major demand ramp-up for electrical steel.

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Prateek Biswas, Senior Analyst, Supply Chain and Technology, IHS Markit

The announcement that The Medicines Patent Pool, Pfizer and Merck Sharpe Dohme (MSD) are joining ranks to license two new oral COVID-19 therapies to low- and middle-income countries is great news. How does IP help make such agreements possible?

CoinAgenda (www.coinagenda.com), the premier global conference series connecting blockchain and cryptocurrency investors with startups since 2014, and BitAngels (www.bitangels.network), the leading network of bitcoin and blockchain investors, today announced that special guest Nio Garcia will be performing for all CoinAgenda attendees at SDG Exchange's Exclusive Concert Series. The concert will take place on December 9 at 10 pm at the popular 7eight7 Nightclub, as part of the fifth annual CoinAgenda Caribbean event in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Tickets and the full agenda are available on the event page. CoinAgenda or SDG Exchange tickets are required to attend the concert as the event is closed to the public. 

Nio Garcia is a native-Puerto Rican dancer and world-class choreographer, recently turned rapper and film actor with over 18 million listeners on Spotify. One of the trailblazers of the reggaeton movement, he's released hits such as ‘Te Boté', ‘AM', and ‘Mírame'. 

Presented by SDG Exchange, a global sustainability marketplace dedicated to reversing climate change one transaction at a time, the SDG Exchange's Exclusive Concert, will serve as a CoinAgenda Afterparty Concert closing out three days of events covering everything crypto and blockchain including: the Future of Digital assets, Crypto Banking, the Growing Utility of NFTs, Play-to-Earn Gaming, the DeFi and TradFi relationship, Latin America and Crypto, Stablecoins, Scaling Solutions, Blockchain Companies in Public Markets, Creating a Clean Crypto Future, Smart Cities, Crypto Investing Strategies, and Structuring to Protect Assets.

“We are proud to be a co-sponsor of CoinAgenda and part of Puerto Rico Blockchain Week,” said Jason Cooner, SDG Exchange founder and CEO. “We see Puerto Rico as a growing blockchain hub full of opportunities for entrepreneurship.”

CoinAgenda Caribbean will gather top speakers including Brad Garlinghouse, Founder of Ripple; Dan Morehead, CEO of Pantera Capital; Brittany Kaiser, Executive Chair of Gryphon Digital Mining; Jason Cooner, CEO of SDG Exchange, Michael Wagner, Co-Founder & CEO of Star Atlas; and Robert Viglione, CEO at Horizen Labs.

As an international conference series, CoinAgenda Caribbean is supported by some of the world's leading blockchain and cryptocurrency companies including:

Platinum Level:

• SDG Exchange - SDG Exchange is a global sustainability marketplace dedicated to reversing climate change one transaction at a time.

Gold Level:

• Horizen Labs - Horizen Labs is a blockchain technology company that provides the best tools to build blockchains and applications for real-world use cases with privacy options, low transaction fees, and configurable revenue models.

• FV Bank - FV Bank is a global digital bank providing business and individual accounts globally. It supports multiple currencies, international payments, investment accounts along with debit and prepaid cards. 

• Dfinity - (Gold Dinner Sponsor) The DFINITY Foundation is a nonprofit organization that develops the Internet Computer, a decentralized, open-source, general-purpose blockchain designed to host smart contracts. 

Silver Level

• FIO - FIO is to crypto, what HTTP is to the internet. FIO Protocol is the open-source and decentralized crypto usability layer that makes sending, receiving and even requesting crypto easier than ever and dramatically less risky to use. 

• Starter Capital - Starter Capital is the venture arm of Starter International, where we incubate and invest in the best projects in DEFI. Starter Capital empowers blockchain and digital currency innovators with resources and access to capital to help create a new future.

• Rair Tech - RAIR is a blockchain-based digital rights management platform that uses NFTs to get access to streaming content.

Bronze Level

• HeartRithm - HeartRithm is a regenerative engine for social impact. Their mission is to apply artificial intelligence algorithms to the global trade of digital currency, redistributing capital to philanthropic causes and social impact projects, accelerating the growth of a heart-centered culture. 

Section Sponsors

• DLTx - DLTx is a public company listed on the Norwegian Oslo Børs Stock Exchange and is the enterprise vendor for DAOs and blockchain protocols that offers unique access to the public blockchain markets & well-priced access to funding. 

• OriginTrail - OriginTrail is the world's first Decentralized Knowledge Graph is organizing humanity's most important assets, and making them discoverable, verifiable and valuable.

• unFederalReserve - unFederalReserve is a fintech SaaS company combining software built on blockchain technology and 200 years of consumer lending experience. Their banking products are designed for smaller U.S. Treasury chartered banks and non-bank lenders in need of a DeFi strategy and greater liquidity without sacrificing security or compliance.

• Blockchain Wire - Blockchain Wire is the industry's first blockchain press release distribution service focused exclusively on news about blockchain, distributed ledger technology companies, ICOs, STOs and other blockchain and cryptocurrency-related announcements. 

• Transform Group - Transform Group is the world's leading blockchain public relations, advisory, events and social media company, with offices in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Toronto and global headquarters in San Juan, Puerto Rico. 

• Bit Digital - Bit Digital is one of the world's largest publicly-listed bitcoin mining companies. Bit Digital is a sustainability-focused generator of digital assets with large-scale, global mining operations representing a currently-owned maximum hash rate of 1,603 EH/S. 

For more information regarding CoinAgenda, please visit  www.coinagenda.com. 

To purchase tickets or view the agenda for CoinAgenda Caribbean, visit the event page: www.coinagenda.com/coinagenda-caribbean-2021. 

To learn more about Puerto Rico Blockchain Week, visit www.prblockchainweek.io.

Connect with CoinAgenda: 

Twitter  Facebook  Telegram

ABOUT COINAGENDA

Now in its eighth year, CoinAgenda is the leading global conference series connecting professional investors, traders, family offices and digital currency funds with top entrepreneurs in the blockchain and cryptocurrency sectors. CoinAgenda Caribbean focuses on international blockchain investing trends, with world-class speakers from around the globe, plus a special focus on blockchain economic development, friendly jurisdictions, the rise of security tokens, enterprise applications, and changes in digital currency funding vehicles and digital currency exchanges. CoinAgenda is an experience that allows all attendees to meet, mingle, and get to know the leading thought leaders, entrepreneurs and investors in the sector, including memorable parties at unique locations. 

With the timer consistently within the less-than six hours range, FOMO3D—the infamous cryptocurrency game now available on Binance Smart Chain (BSC)—has entered into the late stage. In honor of this landmark point, and to commemorate the pot's value surpassing 500 BNB ($311,000 USD), the development team charged with porting the game over to BSC have followed in the steps of the original team. On November 29^th, the team behind FOMO3D/P3D, will release “FOMO3D Short.” 

This version of the game follows similar mechanics as regular FOMO3D: the last person to purchase a key collects the pot; however, in FOMO3D Short, the price per key scales dramatically with each purchase, and a shorter timer of 30 minutes turns what is normally a months-long game into a wild scrum for the pot.

A Week of Benchmarks

The release of FOMO3D Short comes in conjunction with the project's recently touted perfect audit score by BlockMasters, which the development team believes will encourage a new round of investment. In addition, the release of FOMO3D Short is the next step in the project's multifaceted cryptocurrency ecosystem, wherein holders of the P3D tokens will receive dividends for holding the token through rounds of FOMO3D Short, as they are awarded portions of the pot from each round.

“We're really excited to be rewarding those who have been holding onto the token from the start,” said the project's marketing developer, ‘Captain.' “Combining the release of the of FOMO3D Short with our affiliate programs for influencers, and upcoming listings on CoinMarketCap and CoinGecko, we believe that those who have served as the backbone of our ecosystem will be happy with their investments.”

Blazing New Trails

But beyond revamping the ideas from previous developers, this new team has plans to go even further. “We've been exploring major industry trends at the moment—Squid Games and NFTs, in particular—and we're thrilled to be able to integrate them into the FOMO3D/P3D ecosystem, we think they could present opportunities to be real game-changers.”

Currently, P3D is available on PancakeSwap and Rubic Exchange, keys for FOMO3D are available on the website and can be purchased through MetaMask or Trust Wallet. 

To connect with the team behind Fomo3D and P3D, follow their Twitter, or join them on Telegram.

Data on patent acceptances into 2021 confirms that the Intellectual Property Laws Amendment (Raising the Bar) Act 2012 (‘RtB Act’), which came into effect on 15 April 2013, has had a minimal impact on the rate of patent application acceptance in Australia – and to the extent that an effect is present, it does not run in the direction that might be expected!  Here, I define ‘rate of acceptance’ as the proportion of examined applications that go on to be accepted for grant.  Between 2009 and 2013, the rate at which applications subject to the former (i.e. pre-RtB) provisions were accepted rose from 69% to 72%.  In comparison, the acceptance rate of post-RtB applications has stabilised at around 75% in each year between 2017 and 2021.

Some people may have anticipated that, in raising the standard of inventive step and introducing stricter requirements for enablement and support of claims, the RtB reforms would result in fewer applications being accepted.  I was not one of those people, and I expect that neither were most other patent attorneys.  Those of us who work on behalf of patent applicants are well-aware that, firstly, most of those applicants are seeking patent protection in other jurisdictions that have high standards of patentability, and are not wasting time and money on equivalent Australian applications for inventions that do not meet those standards.  And, secondly, encountering a higher bar to acceptance does not necessarily mean abandoning the application altogether; often it may simply mean settling for a more limited scope of protection.

Perhaps more surprisingly, however, raising standards of patentability has not resulted in applicants making more rounds of amendment to their applications in order to achieve acceptance.  In fact, if anything applications examined under the post-RtB provisions have been, on average, subject to fewer amendments in examination than pre-RtB applications.

Interestingly, in the transition between the two legal regimes, the earliest applications to be examined under the provisions of the RtB Act had acceptance rates in excess of 90%, while acceptance rates of the last applications to be examined under the former provisions fell to below 50%.  These effects are most likely attributable to the respective applicants’ strategies in pursuing early examination of post-RtB applications, and in persisting to the bitter end with some pre-RtB applications.

Another interesting observation is that expedited examination has become increasingly popular in the years since the RtB reforms commenced, rising from just under 6% of all cases in 2014/15 to over 8% in 2020/21.  In particular, expedited examination under the Global Patent Prosecution Highway (GPPH) program rose from just 2.7% of cases in 2013/14 to 5.1% in 2019/20.  In fact, GPPH requests were the majority of all expedited examination requests in every post-RtB year except for the first (2013/14).

Finally, the most recent data confirms (once again) that the duration of patent prosecution (i.e. from examination request through to acceptance, in successful cases) has reduced significantly – from a median of over 600 days, to a little more than 400 days – since commencement of the RtB reforms.  This has been due, in almost exactly equal parts, to the tighter time constraints imposed on applicants, and to reductions in Patent Office delays in commencing examination after a request has been filed.

Read more »

In this article, we review 3 intriguing IPO stocks for investors to watch.

Pollen DeFi (https://pollen.id/), the decentralized protocol that facilitates ‘hivemind' weighting of asset pools that back up market-tradable tokens, today revealed their upcoming ‘Incentivised Beta' platform release and details on how the ‘DeFi 2.0' protocol will enable its unique community-managed financial instrument. The ‘Beta' release, which goes live in December, will initially enable users to contribute to the continual balancing and rebalancing of a singular central asset pool that will back up a tradable asset token. The protocol will be open to whitelisted users who can begin building community credibility (in the form of a ‘reputation' score), compete for a position on the community leaderboard, and, in turn, will have a chance to earn mainnet Pollen ($PLN) governance tokens. 

Pollen DeFi aims to push ‘DeFi' into the ‘DeFi 2.0' era by moving beyond institutional imitation and removing centralized “middlemen”; the platform instead empowers user-curated cryptocurrency asset pools that are constantly refined via a merit-based balancing of users' portfolio suggestions. Community members are rewarded for making good decisions and subsequently gain more influence over the dynamically-rebalancing portfolio.  Alternatively, users who would prefer to turn to more qualified traders (based on proven reputation, scored by the platform) can delegate their voting power accordingly. These ‘hivemind approved' asset portfolios then back up ‘asset pool tokens' listed as easily accessible financial instruments capable of outperforming market fluctuations.  

Boosted earlier this year by strategic backers, The Graph and AlphaBit, Pollen DeFi is focused on building the ultimate ‘crypto meritocracy'; the salient, DAO-driven ‘DeFi 2.0' experience leans on the fact that the leadership team merely creates and hones the core technology and UI, ensures platform security, and facilitates user governance and ease of accessibility, while the diversity of opportunities presented within the financial instrument itself result from decentralized, community-contributed portfolio suggestions. Pollen DeFi is powered by two new tokenized assets built specifically with DeFi 2.0 in mind, the Pollen ($PLN) governance token and the native Portfolio Asset Index token ($PAI) which is backed by the total value locked (TVL) of the first and core asset pool on the platform.  Other crypto-communities, influencers, and even top-ranking Pollen DeFi users will be able to propose additional asset pools that will be continually re-balanced by user proposals and support new asset-backed tokens, similar to the $PAI token.

Pollen DeFi's move from Alpha to Beta with a dramatically upgraded protocol design is supported by an already strong community of followers wishing to begin the process of actively contributing to the balancing of the asset pool. Pollen DeFi's open-source protocol and merit-based system empowers the brightest minds in its community and incentivizes them to continually contribute. This means that $PAI token is backed by a continually rebalanced and optimized asset pool which aims to out-smart market fluctuations with overall global community intelligence ideal for the 24/7 nature of the cryptocurrency market.

Pollen DeFi Project Lead and Co-Founder, Philip Verrien, explained, “Our focus has been on rebuilding asset management from the ground up; reducing risk and volatility, while also maximizing yield and creating dynamic opportunity for anyone, regardless of their experience level; [Pollen DeFi] aims to be the embodiment of what we believe will be the next step in DeFi, and reflect the core principles of truly decentralized finance.” Pollen DeFi's community is at the center of it all; Verrien and his team have designed Pollen DeFi to be powerful and easily accessible not only for the experienced crypto traders hoping to receive community accolades and earn $PLN token rewards for sharing their alchemic index ratios, but also, for those crypto-newcomers who are more familiar with curated asset indexes from TradFi and retail crypto environments consisting of pre-vetted coins and tokens - these users will be able to use Pollen ($PLN) governance token or hold $PAI asset pool token to easily be a part of the secure and well-tuned, ‘hivemind-approved' asset portfolio. 

Pollen DeFi focuses on user participation and utility. It is designed to tackle governance and centralization issues commonplace in today's DeFi ecosystem. Focusing heavily on developing community participation incentives, and processes that build toward true decentralization, using the hivemind to put the community in control.

The $PAI token will be the first index token to be launched on the platform with its value tied to the TVL of the core asset pool. $PAI is designed to be a less volatile asset that provides a safer way to participate in the DeFi ecosystem and is designed to weather any market storm as it will be dynamically managed by the community 24/7. $PLN, on the other hand, is the governance token that allows participants to interact with the platform and is rewarded to community members who actively manage the portfolio successfully or delegate to those that do (from a leaderboard). 

Beginning in December, whitelisted users will be able to actively contribute suggestions to Pollen DeFi's first community-managed portfolio and associated asset pool token, Portfolio Asset Index ($PAI); reputation points earned during this part-testnet, part-mainnet ‘Community Release Incentivised Beta' will be ported over as part of full mainnet launch in Q1 2022. This means that whitelisted early adopters who engage with Pollen's ‘Community Release Incentivised Beta' will appear on the leaderboard once the platform is fully live on mainnet.  The Pollen DeFi team will be releasing more information regarding the community release whitelist and details for those that can participate in the coming weeks, in the meantime anyone interested can join Pollen's telegram group (https://t.me/pollen_dao) or follow @PollenDeFi on twitter. 

For more information, please visit pollen.id.

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About Pollen DeFi

Pollen DeFi (https://pollen.id/), is a first of its kind decentralized asset management ecosystem where the community builds and manages crypto asset portfolios together. Decentralized finance is designed to be by the people, for the people, and Pollen DeFi is acknowledging this by building the first, truly decentralized platform for managing tokenized asset pools. The merit-based DAO provides a reputation-based governance protocol with incentives that leverage the community's collective wisdom to curate asset pools. In this system, all users of the platform stand to benefit from the contribution of the best performing participants. Initially, the Pollen DeFi platform and its Pollen governance token ($PLN) will manage a single asset token, the Portfolio Asset Index ($PAI) token. The $PAI token will be managed 24-7 by the community and is designed to be a low volatility ‘DeFi Lego' which can be used in other protocols in the decentralized finance ecosystem. After Mainnet launch, other communities will be able to create and manage alternative asset tokens via the Pollen DeFi platform.

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