One order is for its new DSS 450 MonoCast silicon growth technology and the other order is for additional GT DSS450HP casting furnaces. UTECH will upgrade a portion of their current GT DSS450 casting furnaces to begin producing MonoCast wafers, which will strengthen its competitive position as a wafer supplier to meet the expected demand for higher efficiency solar cells. In addition, UTECH is also increasing its total wafer production capacity with additional GT DSS450HP multicrystalline casting furnaces to meet the demand from its key customers.
This is the first commercial order for our new DSS MonoCast technology, and we are pleased to be working with our long-time PV customer UTECH Solar, said Tom Gutierrez, GTs president and CEO. We expect that the PV industry will begin to transition a portion of its traditional multicrystalline wafer production capacity to new crystalline growth technology such as our DSS MonoCast systems that offer wafer producers additional revenue opportunities by selling higher value wafers because of their inherently better material quality.
We are seeing a growing interest from our solar cell customers for higher quality wafers capable of producing higher efficiency cells, said Ben Pan, executive administrator, Utech Solar Corporation. GTs DSS 450 MonoCast technology will give us this capability and the additional DSS450HP systems will add to our overall production capacity allowing us to increase our competitiveness as the PV industry begins to recover in the coming years.
The DSS450 MonoCast system delivers high mono volume yields. The system features advanced hardware and an industry first automatic seed retention feature that eliminates dipping and operator intervention between the melt and growth cycles helping to automate the process and enabling the production worthiness of the DSS450 MonoCast system. Customers currently operating DSS furnaces can migrate to the new DSS450 MonoCast system through a field upgrade.
