In his blog, James Moyne talked about Applied Materials’ software footprint as it relates to crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar production. James highlighted a specific scenario where advanced process control plays an important role in addressing issues associated with solar cell printing. As this type of technology becomes widely adopted, the c-Si solar industry will collectively improve processes and drive the quality and conversion efficiency of the product to new highs.

The LED manufacturing world has an interesting mix of semiconductor technology and c-Si manufacturing practices. This raises the question: can automation software be beneficial—and affordable—for LED production lines? The answer is YES, and I’ll begin to tell you why.

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Recent news from Spectrolab Inc., asserts that a triple junction solar cell has achieved the world record in efficiency, converting 41.6% of sunlight into electricity. While tremendously impressive and promising, this technology is targeted for implementation in space. Our focus at Applied is on achieving breakthrough efficiencies for rooftop and utility photovoltaics applications. We must achieve this with efficient and low cost manufacturing technologies capable of converting the most electrons for your solar buck.

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