London 10 November 2009 

Launch of Innovation Partnerships to support industrial partners developing practical applications of gold: Will co-invest with venture firms to accelerate commercialisation of gold-based innovations. 

The World Gold Council (‘WGC’) today announced the launch of new strategic initiatives to develop the long-term industrial markets for gold.  WGC will co-invest with venture firms to accelerate the development and commercialisation of gold-based innovative technologies. Through its new Innovation Partnerships, WGC will support companies engaged in the development of new practical applications for gold.

Industrial demand for gold, in the five years to 2008, was 440 tonnes per year, around 12% of total demand. Gold’s unique attributes make it an ideal technical material for a range of industrial applications. Most demand currently comes from the electronics industry through gold’s use in semiconductor chips.  Additionally, there are many emerging uses for gold in new fields including pollution control catalysts, fuel cells, functional coatings and nanotechnology which show genuine potential to expand this market. 

WGC’s unrivalled breadth and depth of understanding of the industrial uses for gold affords a unique position to help facilitate and accelerate commercialisation of cost effective, gold-based innovations.

Venture Investments: Through this initiative, WGC will increase its engagement with early stage ventures to support and accelerate the commercialisation of emerging gold-based technologies to market. It is already a key investor in one start up company developing an innovative use for gold in the automotive industry.

Innovation Partnerships:  This initiative will enable WGC to collaborate with precious metal, chemical, electronics, materials and biomedical companies, ranging from small enterprises through to established international businesses, where there is real market potential to exploit gold’s unique technical properties.

Dr Richard Holliday, Director, Industrial, at World Gold Council, said: “Both the Innovation Partnership programme and our increasing engagement with the early-stage venture community will help ensure that the highly promising gold-research currently emerging from university laboratories has the best possible chance of quickly reaching the market place and being commercialised.  Although the gold price is high by historical standards, modern coating techniques and nanotechnology allows engineers and scientists to use the metal in the precise quantity required, without excess or wastage.  Gold is still therefore a cost effective material in many applications.” 

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Companies interested in collaborating with World Gold Council are invited to make contact.

For further Information,

World Gold Council, Industrial Sector This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it