NexWafe raised €10m in Series B funding from Fraunhofer, Saudi Aramco Energy Ventures et al.

NexWafe GmbH, a Freiburg, Germany-based manufacturer of monocrystalline silicon wafers, announced that it completed series B funding totalling €10 million ($12.1M).

The money was raised from investors including Fraunhofer, Saudi Aramco Energy Ventures, GAP Technology Holding, Lynwood Schweiz AG and Bantina Invest Limited.

Proceeds will be used to frther augment the company's tech and capabilities as it will proceed with pilot manufacturing activities. 

NexWafe, led by CEO Davor Sutija and founded in 2015 as a spinoff of the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE), produces high-efficiency monocrystalline silicon wafers called EpiWafers, which provide solar panel manufacturers with higher efficiency and yield at a lower cost of traditional monocrystalline Cz-Si, all without having to retool their production lines.

The company is building a semi-automatic pilot production in Freiburg, Germany, and, as a next step, a production facility for mass production of EpiWafers.