toledoblade.com --

After three years of researching, developing, fund-raising, and expanding, Toledo solar tech start-up Xunlight Corp. grew up yesterday by delivering its first shipment of commercially manufactured solar modules. It went to the University of Toledo, the institution that played a significant role in the company's birth.

The modules will be installed on a 10-kilowatt thin-film solar array on the grounds and the roof of the university's Scott Park campus, which is being renamed the Campus of Energy and Innovation.

The campus is being refitted with laboratories for research in solar and wind technologies.

"Our first sale and delivery of solar modules marks a significant milestone for Xunlight, and it is especially noteworthy that the University of Toledo is our first customer," Xunming Deng, the company's chief executive officer, said during a ceremony yesterday to mark the delivery of the solar modules.

University President Dr. Lloyd Jacobs said he felt "tremendously gratified" by the school's role in the birth of Xunlight.

The company, founded by Mr. Deng, got its start at the university's business incubator, which is designed to take commercially viable research done by professors and nurture them into full-fledged businesses.

"It was sort of fun going over there and having Dr. Deng handing me one of those panels," Dr. Jacobs said.

Xunlight was the recipient of more than $40 million in private capital during the past year and has used investor funds and loans to develop flexible, lightweight silicon solar modules. They are made in sheet-like fashion on a proprietary 25-megawatt manufacturing device, which has been hailed by industry watchers as a low-cost solution to large-scale production.

The manufacturing equipment puts solar energy-gathering modules on a three-foot wide, one-mile- long sheet of stainless steel material that moves on the production line, making 720 square feet per hour.

Dr. Jacobs said the maturation of Xunlight is a second large step in expanding the area economy into new technologies such as solar power.

Already, the area has seen the birth and growth of First Solar Inc., which has a plant in Perrysburg Township. And recently start-ups Solar Fields LLC and Willard & Kelsey Solar Group LLC appear ready to take off as well, he said.

"We're at a really interesting turning point," Dr. Jacobs said.

"Shortly, I think we'll see some action [at Solar Fields and Willard & Kelsey], and that's going to be really important for the transformation of northwest Ohio into a place of innovations."

Contact Jon Chavez at:
jchavez@theblade.com
or 419-724-6128.

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