 So, we're here with Pireta and Hai. So, who are you? Well, welcome. I'm Mario Daria. I'm the head engineer in Pireta. We are a company based in England, Teddington, near London. And we do conductive textiles. Our sort of mantra is that we don't use conducting ink. We don't make conductive fabric. We make fabric conductive. And that's exactly what we do. We create conductive patterns on virtually any kind of fabrics. It could be synthetic, natural, stretchable, woven, knitted and non-woven. We are really not limited to the composition of the fabric. And our pride is in a few peculiar points. One is that we don't change the handle and drape of the fabric. It really feels as if there was no conductor printed on it. The stretchability is preserved. There is no difference in the stretchability of the fabric. There is no limitation. In this process, we create thin metal coating at the fiber level. This allows us also to keep the stretch and the breathability of the fabric. There is no interposer layer. And if you look here, this is an example of how we can stretch the fabric without losing conductivity, without losing connection. So there's a thin layer of something. There's a thin layer of metal. What kind of metal? At the moment, we are using copper with a passivation of silver. But we are not really limited to those materials. If required, we can use any material, even gold or harder, more noble materials. Our patented process is based on the creation of a catalyst layer that allows the creation of this conductive layer, of this purely metallic conductive layer. And it is this conductive layer that allows us to have quite another unique feature. We can solder directly on it. We don't need to use low-temperature soldering. So this is common lead free solder with a soldering iron. And the connection is really strong to the point that the weakness is the fabric itself. So if I try to rip this off, what I will ruin is the fabric. And the soldering will still be intact. So how do you put the metallic stuff into the fabric? The process is a five-step process. It is a printing process where we deposit chemistry on the fabric which creates a catalyst layer. And then the fabric is immersed into a bath which coats the fibers of the thread which makes the fabric into a thin layer of metal. So it's a purely metallic layer that with a wet chemistry process is applied at the fiber level. So then you just use it as any other kind of fabric to make the garment? Yes. We can apply this technology at any step of the process not just at the plain fabric stage but also at the finished garment. We have examples where we applied that on a glove. So this was printed directly on the glove. So the glove was both Aziz already stitched and the technology was applied to create conductive trucks which with these conductive, with these tilt-tilt switches we can have sensing to some extent on the fabric. So what team do you have? Well, we are a start up, the team is not big but it's definitely good. This is Ian Russell Hello. I'm Lars Cicio. CCO. So that means... Cheap commercial officer. You're making this into a huge commercial success. We hope so. Early days for us early days but yeah that's what we're trying to do. We're here seeking development partners, joint development partners it's it is early days for us as a business but we've got a strong team and we've got strong backers so yeah we are we're seeking partners who can help us produce the next generation of wearable products. So what kind of partner do you need? Is like Nike, Puma or what? What are you thinking? Yeah sports, power, all medical devices, consumer electronics, there are a large number of brands who are looking to produce wearable products that are based on textiles so moving from either componentized products that you might wear on your wrist to products that are truly wearable garment type products that can be functionalized and made intelligent with with e-textiles. And what do you do? Well in here I am the engineer so it's my duty to a bit create the patterns, create the demonstrators, I'm in charge of the hardware of the design and of the software and of the mechanics part. So what happens when you put in a washing machine? Does it just pull off the fibers? No it's perfectly fine. Really? Yes, we run some tests and we did not find traces of the metal of course the washing process wears the fabric as it wears the coating. It's like after a many washes the collar on your shirt will fade or but it is that kind of wear that happens but it does not fall off the fibers. It remains functional, remains conductive. The bond of the metal to the fibers is very strong, it's very robust so in terms of stretch cycles and rub testing and washing it's a robust process and the conductivity, the functionality is retained. There has to be some issues right? What's your issue? Do you have any issues? Well we like we like to think that we really overcome a lot of the hurdles and of the limitation of other conductive on-fabric technologies. What's the other technologies out there? Well you have conductive thread and conductive inks. Conductive thread you will need embroidery it's besides being a slow process it can get very expensive because there's a lot of thread that needs to be put down. Difficult to solder to it. Printed conductive inks you generally need some sort of plastic interposer layer because the ink sits above the textile it's not inherently stretchable so we've spoken to customers who've tried both of those alternative technologies and they're not satisfied with them and you can see why because they have a fundamentally they have a negative impact on the performance of the fabric. You don't have any negative impact on the performance? No the fabric is left fundamentally unaltered it keeps all the breathability and stretchability. There is really no fundamental change the only thing that you see is that there is a collar and that is printed. Maybe the only drawback is that it's not transparent. Yeah so what are you showing on your video? Is it a demo? It is a summary of what we've said until now. So have you shown this before? Yes we have been to a couple of other events usually in UK because we're a UK based company. You don't sound like a UK based. Oh I'm joking I don't know. I'm Italian my accent may sound like Italian also right? Pireta he comes from a Latin name is the name of a butterfly is called the the glass swing butterfly because we add functionality without having those obvious feeling of adding an extra layer to the fabric so Pireta is actually a Latin name that's hence the name. So what's going to happen? Because it's great to be able to solder stuff on it that's very important right? It makes life a lot easier. Then you can have a higher performance kind of things. You can have all the sensors you have in a smartwatch on your clothes. This is actually out of commercial components. There is nothing there's no component in here that you wouldn't be able to buy yourself. What we provide is the interconnect. The important thing is there's a whole trend in the industry to support the movement of these wearable technologies from as I said enclosures and boxes into wearable textiles. So sensors are evolving into stretchable conformable sensors. Batteries are developing so they're conformable and stretchable. The key thing that is missing is a good interconnect technology and that is the piece of the puzzle we we provide. An interconnect technology that doesn't affect the fabric that allows the fabric to remain breathable stretchable retains the handle and drape. So how many of the other components will be flexible? Flexible battery are you interested or? We are definitely interested in flexible battery and flexible electronics. This is just an added element to our to our technology. Our fundamental aim is to create a truly wearable technology. If you have a smartwatch or smart goggles you are adding an extra piece of technology but what if you could wear your shirt your garment your normal everyday clothes and have the functionality embedded in that that would be wearable technology not an extra piece like a watch it's an extra piece of technology that it's on your it's on your body but it's not like you wear like clothes and that's our aim to enable truly wearable technology. So the one you have here you said was copper it seems to be a fit your so why don't you have it in your nice suits right now how far are we from the you having cool prototypes that are like wearable well there is really no limitation in that I just we just have not put the suit under the machine and printed with it so it's just like a week or what you have everything you just need to start making prototypes you want to do that with with the partners yes exactly that's not our we want to be led by customers we don't want to be producing products we're here to provide the process to enable our customers to produce those great products that's what we're trying to do all right cool so looking forward to uh this changing the whole world right it's happening okay cool