What problem was Pragmatic Semiconductor originally created to solve, and why were traditional silicon chips not the right fit for those applications?
The company was founded to unlock sustainable intelligence to the edge and item-level. Silicon chips deliver exceptional performance, but they come with cost constraints, a rigid form factor and an outsized carbon footprint. That makes them impractical for low-cost, high-volume, disposable or flexible applications like packaging. The challenge was to rethink electronics from the ground up, creating a technology that is thin, flexible, affordable, and sustainable enough to scale to item-level use for everyday objects.
How do FlexICs change the economics of adding intelligence and connectivity to everyday products like packaging or labels?
FlexICs fundamentally shift the cost curve. By enabling electronics to be produced using low-temperature, lower-cost processes, they make it viable to embed intelligence into items that were previously out of reach.
This opens the door to tagging individual products rather than batches, transforming packaging and labels into interactive, data-rich touchpoints without significantly increasing overall cost, whether that’s financial or environmental.
Flexible electronics have been discussed for years – what developments have made it possible to bring this technology to commercial scale now?
Several factors have converged: advances in material science, more stable and scalable manufacturing processes, and a clearer understanding of where flexible electronics add unique value.
There’s now a strong market pull driven by digitalisation and the need for item-level intelligence. This has enabled the industry to move from experimentation to repeatable, high-volume production, which is the critical step in making any new technology commercially viable.
What are some of the most promising real-world applications you’re seeing for flexible integrated circuits today?
We’re seeing strong momentum in areas where low-cost, flexible, and scalable electronics unlock new capabilities. Smart packaging and labelling are key examples, enabling everything from product authentication to consumer engagement. Digital Product Passports (DPPs) are also a natural fit for the item-level intelligence that flexible integrated circuits provide.
Other promising applications include healthcare, where flexible form factors support wearable diagnostics, and industrial use cases, where item-level tracking can provide unprecedented visibility. The common thread is enabling intelligence in places where it simply wasn’t feasible before.
How can embedding low-cost intelligence into everyday items improve traceability and transparency across supply chains?
Bringing intelligence to high-volume, low-margin items that were previously too cheap to digitise revolutionises supply chain transparency. Driven by regulation and global sustainability trends, almost every physical product will eventually require a digital identity. The low cost and low carbon impact of flexible electronics makes it possible to provide an immutable, item-specific record of a product's entire journey – its origin, carbon footprint, material composition and, at end of life, clear guidance on disposal.
This unique digital signature will make it much harder for ‘grey market’ or counterfeit goods to enter the legitimate supply chain undetected, protecting brand integrity and cultivating consumer trust.
Pragmatic Semiconductor also offers foundry services. How does that model help accelerate innovation in flexible electronics across different industries?
While traditional silicon chips take several months to move from design to physical samples, the FlexIC foundry process slashes this to just a few weeks. This allows rapid design iteration, and a "fail fast, learn faster" development cycle, meaning products get to market faster.
This is possible because FlexICs are manufactured using a low-temperature process that’s much shorter than silicon semiconductor fabrication. The innovative process also dramatically reduces the cost and carbon footprint of production.
What are the biggest barriers companies face when trying to integrate electronics into products that traditionally haven’t contained them?
One of the biggest challenges is mindset – rethinking products that have historically been passive. There are also practical considerations, such as integrating electronics into existing manufacturing processes. Overcoming these barriers often requires close collaboration across the value chain, from materials and design through to data systems. We work hard to make that process as straightforward as possible.
We provide a comprehensive set of tools to make it as easy as possible for designers used to working with silicon semiconductors to port their knowledge and skills to the FlexIC platform. And we have an ecosystem of partners who can offer support at other stages of the product development journey.
At the level of consumer experience, silicon chips are rigid and create a tiny but discernible ‘bump’, which both spoils the tactile experience attached to packaging or products and makes them vulnerable to damage during production and transit. By contrast, FlexICs are ultra-thin and flexible, making them imperceptible to the touch and less susceptible to damage.
How could flexible semiconductor technology influence sustainability efforts, particularly in areas like packaging, waste reduction, or product lifecycle management?
Flexible electronics can support sustainability in several ways. In the form of DPPs, they can provide detailed, accessible data on material composition, repair instructions, and end-of-life disposal instructions. This helps facilitate the circular economy by allowing recyclers to identify materials instantly, maximizing resource recovery and ensuring compliance with sustainability regulations.Additionally, flexible semiconductor manufacturing typically requires less energy and water, and fewer harmful chemicals than traditional semiconductor fabrication processes, aligning with broader goals to reduce environmental impact.
Looking ahead, how do you expect flexible electronics to evolve over the next five to ten years, and where might we see the biggest breakthroughs?
Over the next decade, we’re likely to see flexible electronics become far more integrated into everyday life, moving from niche applications to mainstream adoption. Advances in performance, integration, and manufacturing scale will expand what’s possible, while continued cost reductions will unlock new use cases.
Flexible integrated circuits already provide a low-cost, low-carbon way to provide item-level intelligence at scale for billions of everyday items. This ubiquity will accelerate the shift from an Internet of Things to an Internet of Everything, delivering unprecedented levels of insight and innovation.
Interview published by Alex Cheung