A significant fall in orders and bookings within Manz's solar division were partially offset by increased business within its display division, the specialist equipment supplier has reported.
Beneq, a Finland-based provider of equipment for advanced thin-film coatings, has announced plans to establish a subsidiary in Russia and set up operations in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).
The sale of Oerlikon Group’s loss-making Oerlikon Solar to Tokyo Electron (TEL) has received regulatory approval from the Chinese Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM).
Belectric advised that the deal to acquire Konarka Technologies has been completed, with an agreement reached between the two companies. Konarka Technologies applied for insolvency earlier this year and began negotiations with several investors. Alexander Kubusch, preliminary insolvency administrator from Curator, commented, “…our talks have now reached a successful conclusion. Of the many interested parties, we ultimately opted for Belectric Holding, because this company not only offered an ideal solution to the issue of business operations but also went a long way toward upholding the interests of creditors.”
Emcore announced that ATK had awarded it with a contract to supply its ZTJ triple-junction solar cells for use in the AMOS-6 commercial telecommunications satellite mission. The satellite has plans to be launched in early 2015 and will see Emcore’s products used to power the AMOS-6 spacecraft manufactured by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI).
In its newly released mergers and acquisition report for Q3 2012, Mercom Capital Group found that venture capital (VC) funding in the solar industry was at its lowest point since 2008 totaling only US$72 million in 14 deals, compared to US$376 million in 32 deals in Q2 2012.
Having entered the Japanese PV market in August, NexPower Technology has announced a 2MW order of its Xtreme+ Series modules for various projects in western Japan. The modules will be distributed via its Japanese distributor, Marubun Corporation. NexPower states that its Xtreme+ Series complies with Japanese JPEC standard as well as being both UL and CEC registered.