Heliatek pushes organic solar cell efficiency higher

LONDON – Heliatek GmbH (Dresden, Germany), a startup developing organic solar cells, has pushed the record efficiency for organic solar cells higher, achieving an efficiency of 10.7 percent in a 1.1 square centimeter tandem cell. The efficiency was measured by indepdendent test house SGS SA (Geneva Switzerland).

Heliatek, founded in 2006 as a spin off from the universities of Desden and Ulm, is based on the use of small organic molecules to produce highly tailorable, low temperature, low cost organic photovoltaics, which although less optically efficient than silicon could prove to be more economically efficient.

SGS measurements included showed that the cell has improved efficiency under low light conditions and that the efficiency remains constant with temperature.

Heliatek is currently working on its first roll-to-roll manufacturing line installed in Dresden, Germany, to go in production in the third quarter of 2012. It has also kicked off a third financing round to raise 60 million euro from current and new investors for a new roll-to-roll 75 megawatt-peak production line.

"Heliatek is the only solar company in the world that uses the deposition of small organic molecules in a low temperature, roll-to-roll vacuum process," said Martin Pfeiffer, co-founder and CTO of Heliatek, in a statement

Heliatek, founded in 2006, is included in version 13.0 of the Silicon 60 list of emerging startups published by EE Times. Heliatek entered the Silicon 60 at version 10.0 in April 2010.


Related links and articles:

www.heliatek.com

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