It looks to me like this material is a combination of aluminum and Carbon Fiber Composites. Carbon fiber composites have a density of roughly .06 lbs./in^3, and aluminum is roughly .10 lbs./in^3. Also, carbon fiber is stiffer than aluminum in the direction of the fiber. Aluminum is tougher and more impact resistant than CF composites, and has the same mechanical properties in all directions - though lower than the directional properties of CF composites.

In aerospace, there are applications which would benefit from an efficient combination of the properties of both materials. Aluminum could be directionally stiffened and made to be more fatigue resistant by CF composites and the added toughness and isotropic nature of aluminum could benifit certain composite structures... As already mentioned in another post, panel structures and wing skins seem like great candidates for a material like this. I don't see a real benifit for most tubular structures, like bicycle frames.

As for the claims of lighter and cheaper, a lot of that may be misunderstanding by the media. As aluminum is higher in density than carbon fiber composite, and has lower stiffness and tensile strength, I don't see how combining it with a CF composite can make a lighter structure, unless it provides properties which allow thinner skins to be used in foam or honeycomb panel type structures, which don't really apply to bicycles. Cheaper? If less carbon fiber can be used in a given structure, and replaced with aluminum, aluminum is a cheaper material. But then the processing costs to efficiently combine the materials should bring the cost back up.

Metal matrix composites (carbon fiber in metal rather than epoxy) have been desired for a long time, especially if they could be reinforced with continuous carbon fiber, but uninsulated carbon fiber in contact with a bare metal greats a galvanic reaction the corrodes the metal fairly fast. This was a big problem when carbon fiber first hit the boating industry where if it was in contact with seawater, even a stainless propellor would be gone pretty quick. The metal matrix composite (MMC) described in the post above is aluminum with short ceramic, not carbon, fibers within the metal. The short fibers make it a bit stiffer than aluminum alone, but doesn't approach what could be done if continuous carbon fiber could efficiently be combined with aluminum as the matrix instead of epoxy. I think this company is just sandwiching sheets of aluminum with sheets of carbon fiber composites.

Sorry this post got a bit long, but don't hold your breath waiting for any new material to be used in bicycles that is lighter, cheaper and stronger than carbon fiber. Carbon fiber itself, meaning the raw material, has also actually increased significantly in price over the last few years due to an increased worldwide demand. The manufacturers are increasing their supply capacities, but I don't expect any price relief for quite a while...

Jim
(President - Advanced Composite Products and Technology Inc. (ACPT))
Oh yeah - and riding steel