BASF Corporation, the world's leading chemical company, recently announced on its website its cooperation with Seashell Technology, one of the leading nanotechnology companies in San Diego. BASF acquires Seashell's technology, patents and know-how for silver nanowires. With this acquisition, BASF is expanding its portfolio of solutions in the display industry.

Silver nanowires are an increasingly attractive alternative to indium tin oxide (ITO) for transparent conductive layers, which has so far been increasingly used in touchscreen displays. These transparent ITO conductors are widely used in today's touch display industry and are used in consumer electronics such as tablets, smartphones or all-in-one PCs.

The increased use of silver nanowires could change this, because the element silver has the highest thermal and electrical conductivity in the periodic table. In the form of tiny nanosilver, these properties can be used to save materials for electronic areas. For example, for both transparent and electrically conductive films. In addition, silver nanowire is much cheaper than ITO and the production of PCAP touchscreens is also becoming more cost-effective.