Coherent has shipped its 100th Avia laser to the solar industry for use in the manufacture of high-efficiency solar cells and panels. Avia lasers are utilised extensively within both crystalline-silicon and thin-film solar cell production lines worldwide, and are leaders in UV laser-based silicon cell edge isolation, with greater than 90 per cent market share. Avia lasers feature prominently within new production lines for next-generation high-efficiency silicon cell concepts. Applications here include scribing trenches for buried or recessed contact-fingers, selectively ablating dielectric passivation layers for electroless metallisation, and drilling through-silicon vias for wrap-through cells.
All Avia models are diode-pumped solid state (DPSS) lasers, which operate off single-phase electricity and which require no external consumables. Featuring a range of software-controlled pulsing options, Avia lasers are designed as industrial field-integrated lasers for production, and are comprised of reliable components with lifetimes of tens of thousands of hours.
