PEKK Pioneer PaiwoSi Secures Tens of Millions in Angel Funding to Accelerate Domestic Substitution and Industrial Upgrading
Recently, Beijing PAWOS Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “PAWOS”) announced the completion of its angel financing round amounting to tens of millions of RMB. This round was led by Quanhua Technology. PAWOS is dedicated to the synthesis and application development of polyetherketoneketone (PEKK), a specialized high-performance polymer. Its core team originates from the Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Following this successful financing, the company is accelerating the deployment of pilot-scale chemical production and hundred-ton-level demonstration facilities for PEKK materials, striving to rapidly achieve mature industrial application of PEKK in China and fill the gap in the industry.
Polyether ether ketone (PEEK) materials, which are similar to PEKK, have been highly sought after in the capital market over the past two years. Many domestic companies have accelerated their layout in this area, viewing it as a golden track with huge development potential. The PEKK developed by Pivos has significant advantages in terms of performance, processing, and cost compared to other PEKK materials:
From a chemical structure perspective, PEEK is a homopolymer with fixed glass transition and melting temperatures, whereas PEKK is a copolymer whose melting temperature can be tuned by adjusting the molar ratio of its monomers, allowing it to range between 280°C and 390°C. Consequently, PEKK offers a wider processing window than PEEK when fabricating composites, particularly for producing prepreg tapes or materials for 3D printing, thereby facilitating easier processing.
In terms of production costs, PEKK is synthesized from bulk commodity chemicals such as low-cost isophthaloyl chloride/terephthaloyl chloride and diphenyl ether via electrophilic substitution to prepare diols. In contrast, PEEK is produced using difluorobenzophenone and hydroquinone through a high-temperature nucleophilic substitution method, resulting in higher production costs than PEKK. Additionally, the PEKK molecular structure contains two ketone groups, which impart greater rigidity compared to PEEK. This increased rigidity slows down the crystallization rate relative to PEEK. Consequently, when fabricating carbon fiber composites, coatings, or 3D-printed parts, PEKK avoids issues such as warping and cracking that are typically caused by excessively rapid crystallization.
PEKK has extensive development potential and market applications in aerospace, the automotive industry, energy and oil & gas, electronics and electrical appliances, 3D printing, and healthcare. This is particularly evident in the aerospace, 3D printing, and healthcare sectors. Observing the strategic moves of major players such as OPM, Stratasys, and TenCate in Europe and the United States reveals that their current focus is primarily on these areas. Through this round of financing, Pews is poised to rapidly establish its presence in these fields with PEKK.
The founding team of Pivous has been deeply engaged in research at the Chinese Academy of Sciences for over a decade. They have successively achieved breakthroughs in laboratory process exploration and pilot-scale amplification of PEKK materials, resolving core technical challenges facing the PEKK industry, such as control over molecular weight enhancement and distribution, suppression of side reactions, and removal of specific impurities. These advancements have enabled stable improvements in material performance and established a technical reserve for multiple grades. Building on this foundation, the founding team resigned from their research institute positions to establish Pivous, initiating the industrialization of PEKK materials with a commitment to breaking foreign monopolies in the PEKK sector and filling the domestic gap in this high-performance material field.
This round of capital injection has provided the company with ample cash flow, accelerating the construction of its PEKK production base. This lays a solid foundation for further enhancing the quality and performance of PEKK products, speeding up the realization of the goal to break foreign monopolies and fill the gap in China’s high-performance materials sector. Meanwhile, the investors have also brought abundant industry resources to the company, such as cooperation opportunities with upstream and downstream enterprises, technical R&D support, and market channel expansion, thereby helping the company optimize its industrial chain layout and enhance its overall competitiveness.
As a high-quality new materials project recommended by the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Paiwosi’s PEKK project has attracted strong industry partners such as Guoke New Materials and Sinopec Guangzhou Engineering Company. The three parties have jointly explored a new collaboration model, under which Guoke (Zhejiang) New Materials Technology Co., Ltd. and Sinopec Guangzhou Engineering Company will serve as cooperative shareholders in the project company, providing comprehensive support in chemical engineering software and hardware to facilitate the rapid and stable industrialization of the research project.
Guoke (Zhejiang) New Material Technology Co., Ltd. operates a mature chemical pilot-scale base and possesses professional talent across various disciplines related to chemical production. The company provides facilities and expert pilot-scale guidance for enterprise and project implementation, reducing pilot-scale costs for businesses through measures such as factor indicator filing and unified direct distribution.
Sinopec Guangzhou Engineering Company is a comprehensive Grade-A design institute in the chemical industry, with extensive experience in engineering design for the chemical, petrochemical, and pharmaceutical sectors. It provides professional engineering design and technical support for the industrialization of its polyether ketone ketone (PEKK) project, facilitating the transition from laboratory-scale research to large-scale production.
The aforementioned tripartite collaboration not only saves enterprises pilot-scale and production costs, but also provides new material companies with an innovative model through accompanying mutual growth, thereby supporting the breakthrough of “chokehold” materials.
The project introduces advanced chemical production technologies. During the pilot-scale phase, the semi-automated production line combines manual operations with automated equipment, meeting the need for flexible manipulation during experiments while providing a high level of safety assurance, thus offering distinct advantages. In the raw material pretreatment stage, automated equipment precisely weighs and proportions various materials, ensuring that each batch meets exact ratio requirements and laying a stable foundation for subsequent production. During the reaction process monitoring stage, personnel leverage their professional knowledge and experience to closely monitor key parameters such as temperature and pressure within the reaction vessels, making timely adjustments in accordance with experimental protocols to ensure the smooth progress of trials. Through the implementation of this semi-automated production line, Pivous is poised to enhance production efficiency while maintaining consistent product quality. As technology matures and experience accumulates, the production line can be further optimized and upgraded based on actual production conditions, gradually advancing toward higher levels of automation and laying a solid foundation for the large-scale production of high-quality, cost-effective PEKK products.
On January 14, the first batch of project guidelines for the Joint Fund for Basic Research on Large Aircraft, jointly established by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, was officially released nationwide. The guidelines significantly expand research directions related to thermoplastic carbon fiber composites in the field of key aircraft materials, further benefiting the aerospace application of polyetherketoneketone (PEKK) materials. Subsequently, on February 5, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the National Medical Products Administration jointly issued a notice to deploy the second round of the “Open Competition Mechanism” for innovative tasks in biomedical materials. Focusing on key areas such as polymer materials, metal materials, and inorganic non-metallic materials, the initiative aims to select and gather entities with mastery of core key technologies and strong innovation capabilities to conduct concentrated research. The goal is to achieve breakthroughs in a batch of landmark biomedical materials that are technologically advanced, highly innovative, and of high clinical application value; ensure that material performance meets clinical requirements; establish stable and reliable mass production capabilities; and accelerate practical implementation in downstream medical device products. This round of the “Open Competition Mechanism” for innovative biomedical materials explicitly specifies support for the application of PEKK in medical device products.
QuanHua Life is an integrated innovation platform focused on biopharmaceuticals, medical devices, and life sciences. Centered on the core philosophy of “innovation-driven development and end-to-end value chain empowerment,” the company provides healthcare enterprises with comprehensive, full-lifecycle solutions spanning R&D, manufacturing, and commercialization. Committed to delivering these end-to-end services, QuanHua Life supports companies through joint incubation, industry empowerment, financial backing, and management optimization, helping them enhance operational efficiency, mitigate risks, and accelerate industrialization.
Currently, Quanhua Life has made in-depth investments in numerous healthcare enterprises, building an innovative R&D ecosystem that covers the entire healthcare industry chain. The company remains committed to advancing medical technology, striving to bring more high-quality products to market, benefiting patients worldwide, and creating long-term value for society.