ALBUQUERQUE, N.M., Dec. 17, 2019 — Innovative solar technology startup, mPower Technology, announced today that it has been awarded a Phase II Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract by the US Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Soldier Center. The award builds on a successful Phase I SBIR program and enables mPower Technology to develop and test solar modules for soldier portable and shelter power applications. Building on its breakthrough solar technology, DragonSCALES™, mPower Technology will readily meet the Army’s requirements for cost-effective, ultra-flexible, high-efficiency, rugged and resilient solar power products.
DragonSCALES (SemiConductor Active Layer Embedded Solar) are made up of individually interconnected cells of highly efficient silicon that can be meshed into any shape or form. They are lightweight, flexible, resilient and extremely reliable, overcoming the low-voltage limitations of today’s rigid solar cells. Merging off-the-shelf silicon from the photovoltaic (PV) industry and existing processes from the microelectronics industry, DragonSCALES cost-effectively enable a wide range of design possibilities for multiple solar power applications and markets. In particular, they are an ideal solution for the terrestrial and remote power markets, overcoming the power conversion efficiency limitations of technologies like thin film amorphous silicon (a-Si) while supporting “textile-like” flexibility for packaging, stowage volume and portability requirements.
Remote, off-grid power is a large and growing global market. DragonSCALES are ideally suited to enable the next-generation of remote power solutions given the many design benefits they provide such as lower weight, lower cost, easy deployment and removal, damage resilience, form-factor flexibility and shade tolerance.
“We are honored to be selected by the US Army for this Phase II award and look forward to demonstrating how textiles built with DragonSCALES will meet the Soldier Portable and Expeditionary Maneuver remote power requirements,” said Kevin Hell, President and CEO, mPower Technology. “2020 will be a groundbreaking year for mPower Technology as photovoltaic solutions enabled by DragonSCALES are demonstrated, operationally tested and commercially deployed for markets such as aerospace and remote power.”
About mPower Technology
mPower Technology is shaping the future of solar power with a revolutionary new technology called DragonSCALES™ (SemiConductor Active Layer Embedded Solar), a completely flexible, interconnected mesh of miniature solar cells. Leveraging well-established and affordable materials, processes, and tools from the silicon photovoltaic (PV) and microelectronics industries, DragonSCALES enable completely new design options for solar power, removing the constraints of existing silicon and gallium arsenide solar solutions, and enabling highly flexible, resilient, light-weight designs that can be rapidly deployed at extremely low cost. For further information, please contact info@mpowertech.com.
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