I missed this when it was announced back in September. It appears as though fishing rods using nano-technology (originally introduced in 2008 by Airrus & brought to the fore in 2010 by St Croix) will now be available to a much wider market:

[tackletradeworld.com]

... or rather the contrary since it is now exclusively available to Jarden Corp brands.
interesting piece of rethoric nevertheless, to present 'strategic alignment' as a widening of availability...

_______________________________________________
If I'm not going to catch anything, then I'd rather not catch anything on flies.

Prostaff Rodhouse
[www.rodhouse.fr]

Looks like Jarden Corp will have a monopoly on the technology, so I don't see how that is a good thing.

Just sounds to me like they bought some old technology, If St Croix is no longer using it then probably Batson and Northfork are already ahead of the game, There is the top three in the game in my Opinion anyways, although there are some other nice blanks they will just be old technology, still a good product.

3M needs volume, it maybe that there current users could not fulfill there needs and they believe Jarden will. That's what business is about! Not negative or p[positive just the free market working the way it should!

The story on the street is that 3M wanted the manufactures to place there "logos" on the rod or tags, but there wasn't any acknowledgement as to how much was required to be in the rod, percentage-wise. So if some companies choose to use only 10% in their blanks they would get the same bang for the buck (advertisement-wise) as other manufactures that used it at 100% level. You just don't know how much the manufactures are using it and if they are watering it down with older technology. Some companies abandoned 3M and pursued other avenues of equally good chemistries on their own. This hurts me because I'm a retired 3Mer. :-(

Chester

May your line be tight and your beverages be cold!

@ Phil: of course it is! But if a rock falls on my foot and crush it, that's just gravity working the way it should. Does that mean I should rejoice?
^_^

_______________________________________________
If I'm not going to catch anything, then I'd rather not catch anything on flies.

Prostaff Rodhouse
[www.rodhouse.fr]

Laurent, no, it just means your foot was in the wrong place or you didn't have a good grip on the rock! LOL My point was that 3M is one of the USA's leading industrial companies, and they don't make decisions like this on a whim. There must be good business reasons from their point of view. Given that there seems to be acceptable replacement materials, the effect on the custom and or hobby rod builder should be minimal..

Chester, I traded some email with St. Croix and they alluded to this exact point. I asked them why they stopped using the Powerlux logo from 3M and your reply was essentially their response.

Terry