Versarien plc (LON: VRS), the advanced materials engineering group, has today announced that it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with China Tiesiju Civil Engineering Group Co Ltd., a subsidiary of China Railway Group Limited.
CRG is one of the world’s largest construction and engineering contractors and is listed on the Shanghai and Hong Kong Stock Exchanges. CTCE is specifically focused on railway, bridge, tunnel and highway infrastructure engineering and has over 23,000 employees. It is active in China and overseas, including in Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Middle East.
The cooperation between the parties is intended to explore the applications for graphene specific to CTCE’s needs and the options to jointly establish manufacturing capability in China for graphene enhanced products. It will also include the research and development of applications for graphene within, but not limited to, the following areas:
· Anticorrosive and fireproof coatings for the protection of engineering structures;
· Heat conductive and heating materials for the temperature control of structures;
· Sensors for the mechanical monitoring of engineering structures;
· Special engineering plastics;
· Special engineering rubber; and
· Asphalt for road asphalt mixtures.
Subject to the satisfactory completion of negotiations it is envisaged that CTCE will provide funding for any manufacturing venture in a structure to be agreed.
Neill Ricketts, CEO of Versarien plc, commented:
“We are delighted to have entered into this MOU with a subsidiary of one of the world’s largest construction and engineering contractors.
“This relationship with CTCE is complimentary to those we have already entered into in China and others that we are in discussions with. We have a strategy to develop a number of relationships with industry leading partners in China across the wide variety of sectors where the application of graphene can prove beneficial.
“I look forward to reporting on progress with our ever growing number of collaboration partners and entering into further relationships to aid the commercialisation of Versarien’s graphene.”
