Underwriters Laboratories has opened what it calls Europe's largest solar PV testing and certification facility--the Photovoltaic Technology Center of Excellence located near the Frankfurt/Main airport in Germany. The new lab joins UL's existing PV centers in San Jose, CA, and Suzhou, China; the company says it also has plans for new facilities in Japan and India in the works.
SolarBridge Technologies has been awarded US$1.5 million from the State of Texas through the Texas Emerging Technology Fund (TETF) for the development of its module-integrated microinverter and management system. SolarBridge will use these funds to accelerate product development as the company prepares for the 2010 launch of its SolarBridge Microinverter.
Photovoltaics and semiconductor materials provider Voltaix has received $10 million in equity financing from private investment firm MissionPoint Capital Partners. The company also announced the appointment of Mark Schwartz, cofounder and chairman of MissionPoint (and former chairman of Goldman Sachs Asia), to its board.
The Intel Corp spin-off, SpectraWatt has raised a further US$41.4 million from investors that include Intel Capital and Goldman Sachs. The start-up plans to start shipping solar cells in 2Q10. The company said that some of the new funds will help finalize completion of the company's factory, advance internal operations and technology development as well as allow for planned capacity expansions.
Taiwan-based c-Si solar cell producer, Neo Solar Power (NSP) is expanding annual capacity to 800MW in response to continued outsourcing demand from Europe. NSP currently has an annual capacity of over 240MW. The cell producer had already made initial plans to boost capacity by a further 180MW by the second quarter of 2010, due to running at full capacity in the fourth quarter of 2009. Strong demand and extended visibility into it 2010 order flow pushed NSP to raise capacity plans to 600MW in 2010. However, continued demand from European module manufacturers has led NSP to take capacity to 800MW in 2010.
CIGS thin-film PV producer Nanosolar has replaced long-time CEO and company cofounder Martin Roscheisen with semiconductor industry veteran Geoff Tate. The company offered no mention of the ousted chief exec in its official press release, let alone an explanation of the reasons behind the leadership change or any details of his plans, although a spokeswoman did confirm to PV-Tech that Roscheisen will remain as a director on the Nanosolar board.
A new partnership has been formed that will offer self-aligned cell technology from 1366 Technologies via RENA's wet processing technology. 1366's proprietary honeycomb-structured texture to the cell production process is claimed to boost cell efficiency. The texture can be used on both mono-crystalline and multi-crystalline wafers.
Flextronics has dedicated 1 million square feet to create a "Clean Tech Super Site" at its established facility in Port of Tanjung Pelepas, Malaysia. The electronic manufacturing services company already has a range of solar photovoltaics module production capabilities operational at the PTP location, with development plans to increase its site capacity to support 1GW of module production over the next two years.
Premier Power Renewable Energy said that its Spanish solar project development and construction operations have reached record contract backlog in its first quarter of 2010, with more than 3MW of residential and commercial photovoltaic rooftop contracts secured.
Solar Power, Inc. has embarked on a new solar system installation project that will see the company set up eight PV systems at seven schools and a district office in Baldwin Park, California. The Baldwin Park Unified School District (BPUSD) has commissioned the project, which will total 2.24MW on completion, with the aim of saving an estimated $22.6 million in electricity costs.
