Solyndra

Solyndra Corporation

Solyndra logo
Former type	Start-up company
Industry	Energy
Fate	Bankruptcy
Founded	2005
Founder	Christian Gronet
Defunct	2011
Headquarters	Fremont, California
Key people	Brian Harrison, CEO Bill Stover, CFO
Revenue	$100 million (2009) $140 Million (2010)
Owner	George Kaiser Family Foundation, U.S. Venture Partners, CMEA Ventures, Redpoint Ventures, Virgin Green Fund, Madrone Capital Partners, RockPort Capital Partners, Argonaut Private Equity, Masdar and Artis Capital Management.
Number of employees	1100 (approx)
Website	www.solyndra.com

Solyndra was a manufacturer of cylindrical panels of copper indium gallium selenide (CIGS) thin film solar cells based in Fremont, California. Although the company was once touted for its unusual technology, plummeting silicon prices led to the company's being unable to compete with conventional solar panels made of crystalline silicon. The company filed for bankruptcy on September 1, 2011.

Solyndra designed, manufactured, and sold solar photovoltaic (PV) systems composed of panels and mounting hardware for large, low-slope commercial rooftops. The panels perform optimally when mounted horizontally and packed closely together, the company claimed, covering significantly more of the typically available roof area and producing more electricity per rooftop on an annual basis than a conventional panel installation.

The solar panels developed by the company were claimed to be unlike any other product ever tried in the industry. The panels were made of racks of cylindrical tubes (also called tubular solar panels), as opposed to traditional flat panels. Solyndra rolled its CIGS thin films into a cylindrical shape and placed 40 of them in each 1-meter-by-2-meter panel. Solyndra designers thought the cylindrical solar panels absorbed energy from any direction (direct, indirect, and reflected light).

Each Solyndra cylinder, one inch in diameter, is made up of two tubes. The company used equipment it had developed to deposit CIGS on the outside of the inner tube, which includes up to 200 CIGS cells. On top of the CIGS material, it added an "optical coupling agent", which concentrates the sunlight that shines through the outer tube. After inserting the inner tube into the outer tube, each cylinder is filled with a silicone oil, then sealed with glass and metal to exclude moisture, which erodes CIGS's performance. The hermetic sealing technology is commonly used in fluorescent lamps.