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Applied Ventures Invests in Solaicx

Applied Ventures, LLC, the venture capital fund of Applied Materials, Inc., has invested $3 million in Solaicx, a manufacturer of cost-effective, single-crystal silicon wafers for the solar photovoltaic industry. Solaicx plans to use the investment to expand its business with a second U.S. manufacturing site, scheduled for 2007 operation. Solaicx’s technology is based on a proprietary, continuous Czochralski crystal growing methodology that enables high-volume manufacturing of cost-effective, high-quality ingots for conversion into solar wafers. The Solaicx crystal growing equipment is expected to be up to five times more productive than traditional CZ systems that were designed primarily for the semiconductor industry. “Our investment in Solaicx aligns well with Applied Materials’ solar strategy and enables Applied to expand its presence in the solar value chain,” said J. Christopher Moran, vice president and general manager of Applied Ventures. “Applied is committed to providing the solar industry with technology and process innovations to reduce the cost per watt of solar power. Solaicx meets these requirements — offering improved manufacturing technology to facilitate the streamlined manufacturing of solar cell wafers.” Applied Materials, Inc. (Nasdaq:AMAT) is a leader in Nanomanufacturing Technology(TM) solutions for the fabrication of semiconductor chip, flat panels, solar photovoltaic cells, flexible electronics […]

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Moser Baer Invests in Stion

Moser Baer PhotoVoltaic Ltd, a subsidiary of Moser Baer India Ltd, has acquired a significant minority stake in Stion Corporation, a nanostructures technology company, formerly known as NStructures. Moser recently invested two solar concentrator technology companies, Solaria and SolFocus. Ravi Khanna, Moser Baer Photovoltaic CEO said, “This is in line with out strategy to reduce the cost of solar power generation significantly by straddling multiple future technologies and emerge as an engineering and technology driven company. We are decisively responding to the rapidly expanding solar PV market, where worldwide demand far outstrips supply.” This third investment is part of $17 million the PV subsidiary will be investing in emerging solar cell technologies. The company is investing in disruptive technologies like concentrator photovoltaic and nanotechnology that’s forcing the restructuring of dominant solar technologies and that has the potential to compete with existing PV and conventional energy technologies.

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Subsidies Keep trawlers Strip-Mining Sea

URL: http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=c69635f6-434e-49c6-bed5-1653a706f1ee&k=45736 Website: http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=c69635f6-434e-49c6-bed5-1653a706f1ee&k=45736     

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BP Solar: Expands to Largest US Facility

BP Solar’s expansion plans will make it the largest fully integrated solar plant in North America – it will also integrate key green building features. The company plans to expand its North American headquarters in Frederick, MD., investing $70 million to double its US solar manufacturing capacity (to 150 MW) and adding 140,000 square feet of building space. Construction is slated to begin in the first half of 2007 and finish by the end of 2008. According to Lee Edwards, BP Solar CEO, “In addition to expanding our manufacturing capacity, our plans are to upgrade the interior of the existing facilities and to use sustainable building techniques such as a roof garden, bio-retention, extensive water recycling and the utilization of LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) design components such as energy efficient lighting, heating and cooling.” BP Solar has over 2200 employees with manufacturing facilities in the U.S., Spain, India and Australia.

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