Harnessing Collective Wisdom

We’ve talked about the economic and environmental benefits of local solar ecosystems before on this blog, but even the best team can benefit from the experience of others, wherever they’re located. When it comes to making anything work better, collective wisdom is a powerful tool.

Running a factory to make solar panels is complicated. All the pieces have to work together in the same way every time to produce a consistent product and maximize the megawatt output of the factory.

We recently announced that ENN Solar Energy, a leading manufacturer of large-size solar modules, selected Applied Materials’ Global Services to support their SunFab™ Thin Film Line on their behalf. That means Applied’s dedicated team of engineers is now servicing every SunFab factory in the world that’s in production.

This allows us to bring our accumulated knowledge to bear to the benefit of all our SunFab customers, keeping their lines up and working at optimum efficiency. This networked intelligence also drives innovation, as an improvement developed at one site can be quickly replicated around the world. Working with our customers, we’re constantly evolving the best ways to operate and maintain each piece of equipment that makes up the line and also the way the pieces interact.

Ultimately, this networked intelligence works to the benefit of all, expanding and refining the state-of-the art in solar module manufacturing and keeping us on the fastest path to the lowest cost-per-watt of solar electricity.