Flamac and Imec combine expertise to develop new materials for solar cells

Flamac’s recently installed PVD (Physical Vapour Deposition) / PE-CVD (Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapour Deposition) coater allows the automated deposition of a variety of thin film materials. The platform consists of 8 process chambers enabling the study of PVD and PE-CVD coating processes. This coating system combined with the variety of high-throughput analytic tools available at Flamac represents a powerful screening platform for accelerated screening of novel materials.



Imec’s research on solar cells focuses on improving the state-of-the-art efficiency and manufacturability of a number of key technologies, most notably silicon-based solar cells, and thin-film solar cells such as organic solar cells and printed inorganic cells based on nanoparticle inks. Imec’s thin-film solar cell activities are integrated in the Solliance collaboration platform. Solliance’s ambition is to strengthen the position of the Eindhoven-Leuven-Aachen triangle (ELAT region) as a world player in thin film PV. Solliance aims to realize this ambition by joint use of state-of-the-art infrastructure, alignment of research programs, and close cooperation with the solar business community.



“Enabling R&D centres like imec to speed up their materials development is exactly what Flamac aims to achieve. I’m delighted that Flamac and imec have initiated a partnership in this application area,” says Johan Paul, manager of Flamac, a division of SIM.



“We consider the cooperation with Flamac as an essential part in the broadening of our PV-portfolio. By combining Flamac’s expertise in high-throughput material research with our expertise in thin-film solar cells, we are convinced that we will achieve interesting results in a shorter timeframe. This broadening allows us to maximize the valorization opportunities in Flanders and is a new important step in the strengthening of the ELAT region in the domain of thin-film solar cell technology as we strive to together with Solliance;” commented Jef Poortmans, Program Director Energy at imec.