HelioVolt boosts Series B to $101M

Austin, Texas-based HelioVolt, one of a number of startups trying to bring new thin film solar technology to market, announced today that it raised its Series B funding round to $101 million, up from an initial close of $77 million in August.

The extra cash, from Sequel Venture Partners, Noventi Ventures, and Passport Capital, will go toward the same goal as before, building the company's first plant and rolling out its copper indium gallium selenide thin film solar products.

"The initial factory will be roughly 20 megawatts in volume, and then we will be able to expand that same factory in the same space up to 40 MW," John Langdon, VP of marketing at HelioVolt, told the Cleantech Group.

The cost of the new plant was not disclosed, but he said the company can achieve cost effective production at a much smaller volume than would be needed at a silicon plant.

A decision on a site for the U.S. facility is expected to come within the next two weeks, with volume production beginning in 2009. Langdon said future plants, including sites in Europe that the company is considering, would be around 40 MW.

Thin film solar uses no crystalline silicon for its solar cells, lowering costs and offering a lightweight, flexible product that can be more easily integrated into things such as roofing shingles, curtain walls, and sun shades.

Take a look at some thin film here >>

"In silicon semiconductors, if you change the concentration of some of the constituents by two parts per million, per billion even, the device will stop working," said Langon.

He said very high efficiency CIGS cells have been demonstrated to continue to work, even while varying the proportions of the metals by as much as plus or minus five percent.

"It gives us quite a bit of tolerances and flexibility in how we do the manufacturing and still end up with a good product."

HelioVolt will be starting out with glass based products at first, before moving up to flexible modules.

There are a number of companies working to bring the promises of CIGS from the lab to the commercial market, but no one's made it there yet.

"It is a tricky material, it is very different from crystalline silicon or from amorphous silicon, and even very different from cadmium telluride," said Langdon.

HelioVolt's biggest competitor would be Auburn Hills, Mich.-based United Solar Ovonic, which uses amorphous silicon. United Solar, also known as Uni-Solar, is a subsidiary of Michigan's Energy Conversion Devices (Nasdaq: ENER).

Earlier this month, Uni-Solar announced a multi-year deal to supply 21.15 MW of its thin film laminates to Belgium's Enfinity Management.

Although the thin film on the market has yet to reach the efficiency of traditional silicon photovoltaics, the lower cost has made modules from United Solar and others very popular.

A direct competitor in CIGS is Santa Clara, Calif.'s Miasole, which took in $50 million in a fourth round last month, but has been beset by manufacturing delays as well as a change in management.

Miasole named semiconductor veteran Joseph Laia as its new CEO last month, citing the need for someone with experience at scaling a company up for commercial manufacturing. Former CEO and founder David Pearce will serve as chairman.

Pearce has said the company would be in production earlier this year, then later this year, and would achieve revenue of $100 million by the end of 2007. Production at the company is still not underway.

Some other CIGS developers trying to make it to market include Palo Alto, Calif.-based Nanosolar, which expects to start production later this year, Lowell, Mass.'s Konarka and Halfmoon, N.Y.-based DayStar Technologies.

The extra $24 million in funding for HelioVolt came from new investors who weren't able to get in by the close of the round's first tranche (see HelioVolt closes $77M in Series B funding).

"So we held it open and got a little more in," said Langdon.

The first closing was led by Paladin Capital Group and the Masdar Clean Tech Fund.

Returning investor New Enterprise Associates as well as Solúcar Energia, Morgan Stanley Principal Investments, Sunton United Energy and Yellowstone Capital also invested in the initial closing of the Series B.