Award

The F-35 is made of 300,000 parts from 1,700+ suppliers — including a small magnet found in September 2022 that originated in China, suspending a $6.5B shipment of F-35s from Lockheed Martin. According to an investigation by the Senate Armed Services Committee , up to 15% of all spare and replacement parts bought by the Pentagon are counterfeit or in some way compromised. In addition to blatant counterfeit parts, the DoD is also facing a supply chain crisis in managing obsolete spare parts, particularly electronic components that have a short lifecycle. As a result, the DoD spends $10 billion a year managing and mitigating electronic-part obsolescence. This perfect storm in our military supply chain for spare and obsolete parts has led to record-low mission-capable rates across the Air Force. The average mission capable rate for all USAF fleets in FY2024 was just 67.15%, down from 69.92% in FY2023 and 71.24% in FY2022. The electrical components of the DoD’s vast inventory are at particular risk. Every electronic device the Air Force uses has a printed circuit board (PCB) as part of its core electrical system, ranging from facilities, HVAC systems, vehicles, alarm systems, and communication boards to F?35 jets and missile guidance systems. The manufacturing process to produce PCBs, which are tailored to individual applications can take weeks or longer. Often, the only solution for mission-critical parts is custom assembly, which costs substantially more than $1,000 for a SINGLE integrated circuit.  This is where Electroninks, the world leader in particle-free conductive inks and a frontrunner in domestic electronics components production, can help restore America’s manufacturing advantage with its all-in-one CircuitJet PCB printer.  The CircuitJet line of on-demand PCB printers uses Electroninks’ metal-based inks, which create pure metallic films that are up to 10x more conductive than other inks and metal pastes on the market, reducing the amount of space, weight, and required precious metals in electronics. Because of this striking competitive advantage, Electroninks has already partnered with companies like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman and has nearly $24M in funding through series A and B rounds from Applied Materials, InQTel, Fujifilm, Merck, and others. Electroninks has a customer base that includes Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Boeing, GE (Healthcare), Samtec (cabling), Qualcomm, and Applied Materials with over $7M in revenue for all revenue streams in 2024. For this Phase II effort, Electroninks has partnered with the 58th Maintenance Group at Kirtland AFB to add features to the next-generation CircuitJet IV, including solder dispensing, laser etching/soldering, and pick-and-place capabilities. Additionally, Electroninks will improve the physical form factor of the CircuitJet IV to ruggedize the machine to withstand significant transportation and movement.