NEW YORK, USA: After years of heady growth in the PV market led largely by crystalline silicon, thin-film technology has reached a critical mass and is poised to start taking significant market share from incumbent technology.

Thin-film silicon technologies from turnkey vendors will be ramping up in large scale during the second half of 2008, while cadmium telluride (CdTe) module producers such as First Solar, and new entrants Calyxo and Primestar, execute aggressive ramps.

Meanwhile, copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS) module manufacturers are reaching the cusp of technology viability, with tremendous disruptive potential. However, while the growth rate for thin-film technology will become more robust from the second half of 2008 forward, not every company will win.

With over 100 companies developing inorganic thin-film solutions, most of them with unproven or undifferentiated technologies, clear winners and losers will rapidly emerge, according to a report from Lux Research entitled "Solar State of the Market Q1 2008: The End of the Beginning."

“CdTe module manufacturing costs are less than one third that of crystalline silicon, and the new amorphous silicon turn-key lines by Applied Materials and Oerlikon promise half the cost to start with further declines in the future,” says Lux Senior Analyst Michael LoCascio. “These technologies will be the first choice for the burgeoning utility sector, squeezing out incumbent technology.”

To bring clarity to the solar market, a six-person team at Lux Research studied five solar technologies in depth – 1) crystalline silicon photovoltaics (PV), which dominate the market today, 2) multi-junction PV, used in high-concentrating PV (HCPV) systems, 3) inorganic thin-film PV, 4) organic and Grätzel PV, and 5) solar thermal.

The research team built a new forecast that independently models solar supply and demand through 2012 using a rigorous, scenario-driven methodology, across five technologies, three application segments, and 10 countries. For each technology, the team conducted detailed cost and performance analyses based on interviews with technical experts and reviews of patent and technical literature. From these forward-looking cost and performance projections, the Lux team was able to project the estimated demand and supply for each technology through 2012.