About Heliatek Heliatek GmbH is a company jointly founded by the Technical University of Dresden and the University of Ulm. It closed its first major financing round in 2007 with BASF, BOSCH, Wellington Partners and the High-Tech Gründerfonds as investors after a seed-investment from the High-Tech Gründerfonds in 2006. In 2009, Heliatek was thereby able to gain funding from RWE Innogy, eCapital, Technologiegründerfonds Saxony and GP Bullhound, London, in addition to the shareholders already involved. The company was founded in 2006 and employs today 45 staff between its headquarters in Dresden and development centre in Ulm (Germany).
Mission The mission of Dresden-based Heliatek GmbH is to develop a mature technology of organic vacuum-deposited solar cells and introduce it into the market. The technology development comprises tailored organic absorber materials, device integration, and production processes.
Technology and Latest News As part of a joint research project carried out together with the Technical University of Dresden's Institute of Applied Photo-Physics, the Dresden-based Heliatek GmbH company has achieved a break-through in organic solar-cell efficiency. With a certified efficiency of 7.7 % over an active area of 1.1 cm2, a new record was set for organic solar cells. The previous highest certified value for organic solar cells with practical relevance was 6.1%. It too was set by Heliatek in 2009, together with its partners, the IAPP and BASF. The certification of the cells was carried out by the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE in Freiburg, an independent and globally recognised testing laboratory. The term "with practical relevance" usually denotes solar cells with an active area of above 1cm², as these already display all the main characteristics of large solar panels.
The so-called "p-i-n Tandem Cell Technology" developed and patented by the partners forms the basis for this success. It is based on a combination of two technologies: doped organic materials ("p-i-n technology") and the stacking of solar cells ("tandem cells"). The record-breaking cell uses organic colouring agents specially optimised for use in solar cells, whereby one agent absorbs the short-wave portion of sunlight (blue and green light) while the other absorbs the long-wave portion (red and near-infrared light). The absorbers were developed by Heliatek and its investor, BASF (Ludwigshafen). Doped organic materials, which form the basis of the pin technology, were developed by Novaled AG (Dresden) primarily for use in organic light-emitting diodes (OLED). Heliatek thus creates synergies with the OLED technology, which has already established itself with various products on the screen display market.
Heliatek's technology is based on the thermal depositing of organic molecules within a vacuum. Production processes using vacuums are used in the semi-conductor industry and have established themselves as very stable and cost-efficient. However, the use of vacuum depositing within the organic photovoltaic industry represents an innovation: international competitors in the area of organic solar cells use solvent-based printing processes for polymers, as these have hitherto often provided better efficiency levels and been considered cheap to manufacture. With the new value achieved by the organic solar cells consisting of "small molecules", Heliatek has achieved a performance level which goes beyond that of polymer printing technology. Owing to more stable production processes, vacuum depositing has already won out on the global market over polymer printing in the area of organic light-emitting diodes (OLED).