Waterproof, moisture-permeable fabric is a product having two seemingly opposite properties. The waterproof quality prevents rain, snow, and wind from penetrating the fabric, while moisture permeability (breathability) allows vapor from the body to evaporate through the fabric. Because the material maintains these two conflicting properties at the same time, it is often called a breathing fabric or a second skin. The fabric has a wide range of uses : in clothing for activities such as mountain climbing, fishing, and hiking; or in other goods like tents, gloves, and sleeping bags.
The conflicting properties mean that the fabric is a complicated one to produce, and it is hardly considered possible to achieve the two properties to a commercially viable degree at the same time. In addition, today's consumer prefers highly functional fabrics (waterproof property of over 5,000mm H2O, and moisture permeability of over 5,000g/§³, 24hrs) to ordinary ones (waterproof of 1-2,000, moisture permeability of 2-4,000).
Because waterproof breatheable fabric is a very technology-intensive product, it can only be produced with combined technologies of weaving, dying, finishing, and coating. Hyosung has been able to develop the fabric with their own core technologies, including polymerization of polyurethane resin containing fluorine, and making and binding membranes that are highly waterproof and highly breathable.
Hyosung's product, BiAX-Super, is a superior quality fabric, being waterproof to a degree of 10,000mm H2O, and breathable at 8,000g/§³, 24 hrs, and is soft to the touch. Hyosung has also developed and put on the market seam sealing tape, which compensates for weak areas at stitched seams.
Hyosung's product has very strong price competitiveness--a third less than similar American or European products--as well as maintaining high quality. With such characteristics, it is expected to lead the world market.
| Hyosung T&C Co., Ltd.
450, Kongduk-dong, Mapo-gu, Seoul, 121-020, Korea |
Because a water/steam ejector is a fluid machine which works as a pump or compressor driving high pressure fluids or vapors, this is a very important piece of machinery in vacuum systems and for compressing exhausted steam, which is used in several industries, including petrochemical, atomic and thermoelectric power, food processing, steel processing, and shipbuilding.
Inside the ejector, there are no moving parts, so it is a very durable machine which can run for a long time without breaking down. Therefore its uses are steadily growing to include every industry, and so is demand.
Until now, though, the ejector had been designed only in a few developed countries such as the U.S.A., Japan, and Germany, because it requires significant mechanical engineering know-how, including experimental data and operating experience.
The Thermal Engineering Laboratory at Korea Maritime University (KMU), developed a computer program for ejector design in the early 1980s, and they have since been working on it to prove its reliability and to enhance the functions. That endeavor has paid off in the form of a computer program to design an ejector which can accomplish high vacuum capability of -740mmHg.
It is known that companies are doing calculations by hand based on their experiments and experimental data, and proving design specifications through efficiency tests up to now. But KMU's computer program automatically designs by simply inputting the user's design specifications. Therefore, time, manpower, and expense required to design and test are reduced dramatically. An expert and a personal computer are enough to operate this program.
The program and operating technology have been sold in local and also overseas markets since the middle 1980s. Today, ejectors which were designed through this program supply almost all of the local demand, and are exported abroad to some shipbuilding companies.
The laboratory is not only exporting the program but also either dispatching their experts abroad to educate, or offering a buyer education course in Korea.
| Korea Maritime University, Thermal Engineering Laboratory
#1 Dongsam-dong, Yeongdo-gu, Pusan, Korea, 606-791 |
This new bleach, developed by Oriental Chemical Industries Company, is a more functional product than its predecessors. It not only has the good qualities of sodium percarbonate, but maintains storage stability as well. By using a certain proportion of non-boron stabilizer and another proportion of non-phosphate stabilizer for a coating material, it is non-polluting.
Today, the worldwide trend is to replace sodium percarbonate with sodium perborate which contains a pollutant, boron, and doesn't wash cloth well in cool water. Sodium percarbonate's downside has been its storage instability, so it has not been combined with non-phosphate detergents, even though it is an environmentally-friendly product. To eliminate that problem, producers have been attempting to coat the sodium percarbonate.
There are two materials used for coating. One is a material which contains a boron compound while the other doesn't. A technology using the boron compound was developed and produced commercially by Japan, but it is no longer in use because of environmental concerns. Just three companies in the world, including Oriental Chemical, have secured the technology to make a coating material which does not contain boron.
Oriental Chemical is producing and selling sodium carbonate and hydrogen peroxide, the main raw materials for making coated sodium percarbonate. And with a simpler process, the company has the upper hand in terms of price competitiveness.
Oriental Chemical makes sodium percarbonate from raw materials without an additional purification process, and can make coated particles continually and evenly by controlling temperature and moisture in every process. This method is different than other wet or dry processes. The company will also apply the technology to new techniques for next-generation materials.
By using this product, it is possible to save energy because it cleans in cold water. And the final product, bleach, can be compacted in size. It is also expected to gain a following in developed countries because it is environmentally friendly.
Oriental Chemical has applied for patents in five countries, and is planning to export more than $5 million worth of the product annually.
| Oriental Chemical Industries Co., Ltd. 50, Sokong-dong, Chung-gu, Seoul, 100-718, Korea |
A digital cross-connection system links lines between devices electronically, and retains all functions that traditional transmission systems do. In terms of capacity, it surpasses other switching systems.
The demand for this kind of cross-connection system is multiplying globally in spite of its high price because this product is easy to maintain, has high reliability, and makes it possible to service quickly.
Presently, several companies are leading the market for cross-connection systems by developing various systems--voice signal band, T1 band (American standard), E1 band (European standard), and T3 band (3 times faster than T1).
In the Korean market, a lot of voice signal band cross-connection systems are being imported and used, along with a few T3 band ones. But there has been some compatibility difficulty in the Korean transmission environment where the T1 band and E1 band signals are used at the same time.
Current T1/E1 band cross-connection systems have not only the downside of not fitting the synchronous transmission network which is used in Korea, but also low capacity of 2,000 bands. Because of that, the T1/E1 band cross-connection system hasn't come into widespread use.
This wide-band digital cross-connection system, developed by LG, is designed to cross-connect the T1 band and the E1 band simultaneously. And it works perfectly in a synchronous transmission network. As this system can be applied to every foreign standard, and has the large capacity of 8,000 T1/E1 bands, there is great potential for exporting by using the North American standard.
Regarding maintenance, the system is easy to operate and simple to maintain, so costs are significantly lower than other types of systems.
LG's system is a technology-intensive one which is equipped with all functions to properly compose a transmission network. Its large-capacity switching structure technology and switching control technology can be applied to develop various kinds of cross-connection systems (voice signal band, T3 band).
| LG Information & Communications, Ltd. 20, Yoido-dong, Youngdungpo-gu, Seoul, 150-721, Korea |
Biodegradable sutures sustain an appropriate strength to hold surgically operated parts in a body. After some time, they are broken up by fluids in the body, absorbed and excreted. These sutures have been in the spotlight in the medical field for a long time because of their positive effect on healing quickly with few side effects, as well as their convenience.
Now the market for end-product biodegradable sutures is up to about $800 million a year, and the products are produced in three countries--the U.S.A., Japan, and Korea.
But existing processes do have some drawbacks, primarily in terms of low yield, low reproducibility, and inconsistent properties, which originate from using bulk polymer. And the very reason for bulk polymer is the existing method of low temperature solid state polymerization. Samyang has solved the problems by adopting their new technology of melt polymerization, which produces polyglycolic acid, a raw material for biodegradable sutures, by melting and polymerizing glycolide. The company also adopted a pelletizing process which makes polymer produced in a certain shape. Due to these developments, Samyang is able to secure consistent raw material for polymerizing with equal density, high conservation ratio, and excellent yield.
Pelletizing is a high-tech activity which thus far only two American companies had developed. It is evaluated as the core technology for producing sutures of even property in the spinning process as well as to produce consistent quality raw materials.
The Korean company has also developed ten processes with their own technology. For example, they coated the surface of sutures with a special resin which has no rejection symptoms to the human body and enhances the convenience of knot formation and stability afterwards.
Samyang's Trisorb has 7.35kg¡¤f tensile strength, and 4.19kg¡¤f, which is 20 percent better than other companies' products. But it has a smaller diameter, so that it is more convenient to use and more comfortable for the patient during operations.
This product is now being exported to Germany, Mexico, and France. And its raw materials, glycolic acid polymer, is a new material that can be used in medical applications such as bone plates, artificial ligaments, artificial blood vessels, and matrices for drug delivery. Samyang is gearing up to produce the material on a commercial basis.
| Samyang Corporation 263 Yeonji-dong, Chong-gu, Seoul, 110-470, Korea |
The ICP-MS (Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spect-rometer) is a system instrument which is made using technologies such as generation and handling of high frequency signals, designing and making vacuum systems, and precision circuit design technique. The instrument is extremely difficult to produce, so only about ten companies worldwide are able to manufacture it commercially.
Demand is growing, though, particularly in the U.S. and Japan, where it is primarily used in fields like environmental sciences, medicine, atomic engineering, materials engineering, and geology. In Korea, it was first introduced in 1988 and is being used in research and development applications.
Younglin's ICP-MS is a high-tech instrument, which can analyze elements on the periodic table at levels of ppm (1 x 1 million) to ppt (1 ppm x 1 million).
To produce an IPC-MS, the secret is to develop an interface which delivers a sample ionized inside a vacuum system to a mass spectrometer.
Younglin has designed and produced a precision interface, restraining doubly charged ions from being generated, through controlling on plasma. The research was done in cooperation with KRISS (Korea Research Institute of Standard & Science) to achieve that aim. The company also improved the ion lens to lessen the noise, and enhance the user's convenience.
Younglin's EMS-200 system allows for computer control for the location of the plasma, and high-level analysis capability with kalium, calcium, and steel. In addition, the product has shown excellent performance in terms of continuous operation and sensitivity.
With development of this product, Younglin has secured the high technology needed to make precision analysis instruments such as GC-MS, and LC-MS.
| Younglin Instrument Co., Ltd. # 609, Yuchun Factopia 196, Anyang-7 dong, Anyang-shi, |
