PV and electronics equipment manufacturing and automation specialist Manz AG has reported revenue in the first nine months of 2015 of €169 million, in line with lower guidance due to order delays and cancellations of around €140 million.
According to PV Tech’s preliminary analysis of global PV manufacturing expansion plans for the month of October 2015, new announcements reached 1.1GW in relation to thin film, c-Si solar cell and module assembly.
Teams from solar cell research institute Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) and the university École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in Switzerland have combined a silicon heterojunction solar cell with a perovskite solar cell monolithically into a tandem device and reached a record efficiency of 18%, with potential to hit 30% after further modifications.
Solar Frontier is not only targeting a widely reported reduction in costs around US$0.40 per watt within two years, but is also hoping to reach grid parity in Japan for residential PV systems with integrated battery storage in the next three to four years.
Leading CIS thin-film producer Solar Frontier is expecting to supply a total of 10MW of modules to Netherlands-based distributor, Home-NRG in 2015, due to strong demand.
Embattled PV thin film equipment and module producer Hanergy Thin Film Power Group (Hanergy TF) continues to have its stocks suspended from trading on the Hong Kong exchange since they collapsed in May 2015.
PV thin film equipment and module producer Hanergy Thin Film Power Group (Hanergy TF) said in reporting first half 2015 financial results that it would be restructuring its operations with the loss of around 2,000 jobs, 37% of its workforce of 5,458 at the end of the reporting period.
A report, four years in the making, has been released by the US Department of Energy (DOE), Office of Inspector General into the collapse of CIGS thin-film producer, Solyndra, and the way more than US$500 million of loan guarantees were given out by the department to the failed company.
Swedish thin-film PV equipment specialist Midsummer has been awarded a SEK10 million (US$1.2 million) grant to support production and sales of its cell manufacturing machines.
