Wednesday, March 2, 2011

GE Energy Financial, VantagePoint makes up 1366's new investors

By Kyle Alspach

GE Energy Financial Services is among the two newest investors in solar-power technology developer 1366 Technologies Inc., having taken part in a boosted Series B round for 1366 that was disclosed in regulatory filings in recent months.

The unit of GE (NYSE:GE) said this week that it took part in the $8.4 million extension of the Series B round, which was previously reported by Mass High Tech in December and January.  The extension increased the round to $28.4 million for Lexington-based 1366.

The other new investor was VantagePoint Venture Partners, according to GE, and the extension also included participation from returning investors North Bridge Venture Partners, Hanwha Chemical and Ventizz Capital Partners.

The round brought the total financing for 1366 to $45.9 million. The company is developing a process for manufacturing solar wafers — a building block of solar panels — at a cost 65 percent below the cost of conventional processes.

“1366 Technologies’ efficient and low-cost process produces silicon wafers — the market for which doubled to $7.5 billion from 2009 to 2010 — that can be easily fed into existing solar PV cell manufacturing lines,” said Kevin Skillern, managing director of venture capital at GE Energy Financial Services, in a statement.

In December, U.S. Department of Energy Secretary Steven Chu highlighted 1366 as one of the major success stories of a major clean energy research program, known as ARPA-E. The company’s process is dubbed “direct wafer” and was invented by the company’s chief technology officer, MIT professor and 1366 co-founder Emanuel Sachs.

Executives have said the company plans to build its first commercial manufacturing plant in Massachusetts and expects to break ground by this fall.