Innovalight specialty PV materials company gets acquired by DuPont after successful integration of its silicon-ink screen-printed selective emitter (SE) into mulitple customer crystalline-silicon production lines.

Ultra-pure steam can improve the ultimate efficiency of PV cells by removing contaminants, as quantified by Fraunhofer ISE using Rasirc Steamer sub-systems.

Prof. Masato Shibuya was awarded the JSAP Takuma Award 2011 for invention of the phase-shift mask (PSM) and opening the field of advanced lithography, as reported by independent PSM inventor Marc Levenson.

Qcept Technologies’ ChemitriQ5000 may help GlobalFoundries vs. TSMC in gate-first HKMG integration for 32nm foundry customers with fab metrology for control of yield excursions

For 32nm and 22nm node ICs, Applied Materials’ FCVD and Novellus Systems’ CFD technologies provide gapfill, sidewall spacers, and conformal oxides for logic and NAND, plus SSDP litho.

Applied Materials kills the turnkey SunFab thin-film a-Si/mc-Si PV line, after failing to keep up with CdTe and CIGS thin-film technologies in efficiency and cost, taking ~$400M loss.

Based on proven hardware sub-systems from previous models, Applied Materials has released a new chemical-mechanical planarization (CMP) tool that processes two 300mm diameter wafers simultaneously on each of two plattens. Initially targeting copper interconnect formation for memory ICs, the Reflexion GT tool has passed betasite tests at multiple customers, and reportedly provides 60% higher throughput […]

At the SEMICON West 2009 Device Scaling TechXPOT, moderated by this editor, SEMATECH’s Ray Jammy reviewed the latest results in scaling CMOS transistors. “We are litererally running out of atoms,” explained Jammy. “You can see the number of atoms in a gate dielectric.” When you have such thin layers, how do you control device parameters? […]

Evergreen Solar, the manufacturer of “String Ribbon” solar power products, announced it has finalized agreements with Jiawei Solarchina and the Wuhan government’s Hubei Science & Technology Investment Co., Ltd. (“HSTIC”) for the setup and operation of a new 100MW mc-Si panel fab. Factory construction has begun and the parties expect that wafer, cell, and panel […]

Intersolar North America 2009, co-located with SEMICON West in San Francisco next week, will include a Solar Startups Forum on July 16 to showcase some new technologies that are now in beta tests in the field. Select companies will make in depth presentations and offer insight into the atmosphere and environment of the solar industry […]