New investors GE Energy Financial Services – a unit of GE – and VantagePoint Venture Partners have joined return investors North Bridge Venture Partners, Hanwha Chemical and Ventizz Capital Partners in an $8.4 million extension of a $20 million funding round backing Lexington, Mass.-based 1366 Technologies.
1366 Technologies plans to use funds from the Series B extension to further refine its solar wafer technology. The investment amount for each firm participating in the latest funding round was not disclosed.
The company says it has developed a process to create silicon wafers that reduces the cost of current processes by 65%, which today involve four capital-intensive steps that waste up to 50% of the high-cost, ultra-pure silicon raw material. The new Direct Wafer approach reduces the four-step process to one and produces wafers directly from molten silicon.
The company intends to take its technology into production next year.
SOURCE: 1366 Technologies
