Germany's NexWafe raises Rs 265 crore from RIL, Aramco Ventures and Athos Venture among others

Germany-based silicon wafer manufacturer NexWafe GmbH (NexWafe) has raised €30M (Rs 265 crore plus) from a consortium of its current group of investors-- Reliance New Energy Limited, Aramco Ventures and Athos Venture GmbH-- as well as new investors, including Malcolm Turnbull AC and Keshik Capital, led by Alex Turnbull.

The funds will be used to accelerate the construction of NexWafe's first commercial-scale facility in Bitterfeld, Germany to fabricate the company’s green solar wafers, NexWafe said in a statement.

Davor Sutija, CEO, NexWafe, said: “This investment marks the start of NexWafe’s plan to raise substantially larger funds in the second half of 2023. The funds will be used to break ground on NexWafe’s first commercial facility to speed the renewable energy transition with more efficient, lower cost, green solar wafers for the world’s photovoltaic manufacturers.”

In 2021, Reliance Industries through its wholly owned subsidiary Reliance New Energy Limited, had invested $29 million as a strategic lead investor in NexWafe's Series C financing round.

Parallely, NexWafe will work with Aramco Ventures on a future green solar wafer manufacturing facility in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The collaborative agreement will include participation from the firm’s $1.5 billion Sustainability fund.

In a press statement, NexWafe said its unique, patented green solar wafer manufacturing solution simplifies polysilicon production and reduces energy use and production time. This results in drastically lowered production costs for n-type monocrystalline wafers used for the majority of high-performing solar modules.

The company’s novel manufacturing method delivers wafers that are engineered to the requirements of each customer and already achieving parity with commercially available Czochralski (CZ) wafers. Providing an opportunity to optimize the performance of a chosen cell design enables solar cell makers to ultimately deliver higher efficiencies.

"NexWafe’s process supports urgent U.S. and European efforts to re-shore domestic solar wafer manufacturing and cell production by increasing supply-chain sourcing diversity and resilience. The NexWafe process also reduces CO2 emissions, resulting in a solar-energy supply chain that is genuinely green," the company added.