Playing 20 Questions With A Microgravity Company
ACME Advanced Materials, Inc Announces First Commercial Production of 4″ SiC Wafers in Microgravity
“ACME Advanced Materials, Inc. today announced the successful commercialization of its process to produce large quantities of low loss, electrically defect free (EDF) Silicon Carbide (SiC) wafers in a microgravity environment.”
Made in space, Albuquerque Journal
“We take crappy wafers, the lowest grade we can buy, and use a microgravity environment to turn them into what the industry would call prime ‘A’-grade wafers,” said ACME President and CEO Rich Glover. “We call them ‘S’-grade, or ‘space-grade’ wafers. They’re better wafers than you can get on the market today, and at a better price.” Since last spring, the company has been sending batches of low-grade wafers for conversion to high-grade on contract flights in Texas, although details of the suborbital launches remain confidential. “We signed a three-year agreement with a flight partner,” Glover said. “We’ve flown monthly since April.”
Keith’s note: This company (without a website – at least one that I can find) declines to say how they obtain microgravity conditions by “flying monthly”. It is either parabolic flight, suborbital rockets, or orbital spaceflight. Or have they discovered a new way to “fly” and get “microgravity”? I asked. They won’t say. Its is certainly their IP and its up to them whether they want to share it. But they have suddenly tweeted a lot about why they are not talking.
@NASAWatch haha … nice try. We don't discuss our process. It's a matter of maintaining competitive advantage. Sorry.
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@ACMEmicroG you are unwilling to say how you gain access to space (microgravity) – yet you are seeking to be taken seriously by #NASA ?
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) December 9, 2014
More tweets below.
@NASAWatch wow, you seem angry. The people who need to know – know. Ultimately the market will judge – that's commercialization.
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch ha ha – magic. Our patent is in final stages and should be official in ~ 90 days. You probably still won't be happy
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch We have no obligation to teach our competitors and other countries how to replicate what we are doing – that’s stupid
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch You really think it would be smart to tell the whole world what we are doing just so you can satisfy your curiosity? Sorry, nope
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@ACMEmicroG does your company have any connection to Medusa Space? (Comet’s Tail Amber Ale & Antimatter Energy Drink) http://t.co/ADwRtJBq7f
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch The company doesn’t, I do. MEI founded 2006 – antimatter energy drink, space2O water, comet’s tail amber ale (first space beer)
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch Medusa Space was an initial start in 2012 but the investor didn’t have the funds promised so we restarted as Masterson
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch Got new investors and Masterson became ACME after our proof of concept one year ago
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@ACMEmicroG is your suborbital launch provider UP Aerospace launching from Spaceport America?
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch Ha ha – nice try. Refer to my initial comment
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch Masterson is terminated. Mefusa Space is AZ. Just paid taxes on ACME. Haha maybe I shouldn't
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@ACMEmicroG A reader commented that NM Office of the Sect'y of State says your company is not in good standing. https://t.co/92KTsTMtdU
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch Interesting. I'll have our CFO check it out. Are you worried? Ha hs
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch ACME is incorporated in DE …
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@ACMEmicroG Just trying to understand space commerce pic.twitter.com/jBDr0uFP6n
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch The market will drive the results. That's the bottom line.
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch Will answer the standing question as soon as we get it checked out.
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@ACMEmicroG it looks like you have at least $1,131,902 in investment per http://t.co/1m7fLqlkV4 – Well done!
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) December 9, 2014
@NASAWatch At least … and no government funds. All private
— ACME Adv Mat, Inc (@ACMEmicroG) December 9, 2014
@ACMEmicroG patent application is online in case you are all curious what they are up to http://t.co/5UMBk6Iz0G
— NASA Watch (@NASAWatch) December 9, 2014
In their defense, they don’t particularly need to be taken seriously by NASA per se. They do need to be taken seriously by semiconductor manufacturers and developers. If the product is good, the methods are less material.
If this is really a viable product then it is very cool and worth promoting.
Rich Glover, president/CEO of ACME Advanced Materials, holds a can of Antimatter, a space energy drink produced in a former venture. (Marla Brose/Albuquerque Journal)
http://www.abqjournal.com/4…
Ardbeg did some stuff on ISS.
Professionally run corporations are known for their snotty tweets.
Did some looking around, found Glover posting various places to promote the press release but not much else… except this SEC info.
Dunno if you want to let this out of moderation or not, I’m not trying to be stalkerish, but this is a corporation, so I don’t think there’s anything wrong with looking into it.
Dunno if anyone smarter than me can glean anything useful from this.
http://www.secinfo.com/d1GQ…
They issue press releases etc so ….
“Total Offering Amount $1,631,906 USD
Total Amount Sold $1,131,902 USD
Total Remaining to be Sold $500,004 USD”
Not bad for an initial investment.
Oh, and according to the office of the New Mexico Secretary of State, the corporation is not in good standing:
https://portal.sos.state.nm…
I’ve been waiting a lot longer for any substantiated claims about microgravity for crystal growth. It’s been used to justify the ISS for decades with about as much to show for it.
it’s a lot cheaper and easier to maintain a twitter feed than to host and run your own website.
They do have a web site, ACMEADVANCEDMATERIALS.COM
It’s registered at GoDaddy.com, but they used domainsByProxy to hide the identity of the registrant.
So do I. No biggie. Cuts down on some (but not all) spam.
Agreed. I use it myself. I had in mind more that it wasn’t a possible source of additional information about the company. Sometimes you can find some additional leads that way.
Unencumbered by the facts, my guess is they are using a Texas vomit comet like G-Force-One
http://www.sportations.com/…
suborbital launches…. “We’ve flown monthly since April.”
Maybe not. The patent discusses suborbital sounding rocket flights with sufficient time ~20 minutes.
Here is the original Masterson patent (Acme bought Masterson and this is what they are supposedly flying):
http://www.freepatentsonlin…
Apparently a precut wafer can be heated to an annealing temperature and then cooled pretty rapidly. But whether this really eliminates defects, let alone at competitive cost, is anybody’s guess. Defect-free SiC wafers are already commercially available, of course, they are just more expensive, and there is no stampede to use them, so the cost of any microgravity technology is critical. We have to get beyond the ancient myth that “only” microgravity can produce defect-free semiconductors. This was not even true back in the Seventies. That said, the primary application of SiC in very high power switching devices requires (unlike typical integrated circuits) very large single elements without defects.