Blogger
Tom Cheyney
Tom Cheyney is former senior editor of PV-Tech / Photovoltaics International magazine. A veteran technology journalist / editor / blogger, he covered the semiconductor, microelectronics and solar sectors for many years - since fax machines were state of the art. His PV-Tech blog has become a must-read for industry insiders and observers. He was also chief editor of "The Rise of Thin-Film Solar Technology" book published in early 2010.
If you're a power semiconductor manufacturing executive and you're not at
least examining the solar energy market, you should make sure your
golden parachute is packed and ready to go. The latest chipmaker
talking photovoltaics is National Semiconductor's Brian Halla during
his company's fourth-quarter/fiscal year-end conference call on
Thursday. (The company had
better-than-expected results, btw.)
Here are excerpts from Seeking Alpha's
transcript of the call, offering a few general details of National's apparent solar play. First, from Halla's opening remarks.
"Being the industry leader in power management in the
world entering a clear energy crisis puts us in an advantageous
position to make a major contribution in the area of energy
conservation.
"The first major output of our National 3.0 initiatives will be
unveiled this summer in the photovoltaic area. Our SolarMagic
technology will dramatically improve the efficiency of solar panels,
even for example, in shaded conditions, an innovation made possible by
utilizing our analog PowerWise power management circuits."
In answer to a question about the top two or three new markets
where National will focus its top-line growth, Halla made the following
comments.
"As I said in my commentary, we have redirected many
forces, we directed a significant amount of R&D budget into what we
call key market segments.... One of them that we will have an
announcement in this quarter is solar, or alternative energy, where
we've made some pretty significant gains in for the photovoltaic
technology. We are right now entering a phase of field trials as well
as there is about a six-month certification process with UL and BDE,
and so we have high hopes that we'll have smooth sailing through them.
But that's the closest one, the area of photovoltaic."
When asked how big the solar business is expected to be at National, Halla replied with tongue somewhat in cheek.
"I'm not an expert on solar, we just plan to make a lot
of money there, but in terms of how big the business is today, there's
a couple of things that have held that business back. Specifically, to
answer your question, 0.4% of rooftops that are available for solar
panels, 0.4% in Northern California have panels. If you contrast that
with Germany where their subsidies are a lot higher and much more
friendly, they've already covered 8% of the rooftops. And all of North
America, I think right now, solar has expanded as far as 0.04% of the
available rooftops, or warehouse tops or whatever.
"Clearly the potential is there. The other thing that has kind of
held that market back is the best technology out there today is 20%
efficient on the solar panel, that's with silicon crystal and
everything else goes down from there, including thin-film, which is
like 10% efficient.
"So one of the things that has held back the expansion is that
there is a lengthy time to pay back because the efficiency of these
rays tend to get perturbed by many, many things, including aging,
including clouds, and even bird poop. No, we haven't invented an
electronic bird pooper scooper but we have done something that we think
is significant in the area of improving efficiencies, and we will just
have to let that play out and we will let our partners, we're in field
trial, tell us if they agree with us."
Perhaps Halla has stumbled on a new solar-module cleaning accessory market opportunity.
