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Solar energy pioneers bag €1.6m investment

A fledgling Irish company developing a new way of capturing solar energy to power everything from laptops to mobile phones has bucked the recession by raising €1.6m from investors, including €350,000 in public funds.

SolarPrint, founded last year, will use the funds to start manufacturing solar cell panels that can be integrated into everyday household goods, drawing on sunlight to recharge batteries without the need for a power supply. The green energy firm, based in Blackpitts, Dublin, claims to have found a solution to the ongoing problems of cost and efficiency that have dogged international efforts to make solar cells for the mass market.

A string of Irish and international investors believe they are on to something, including the State's business development agency, Enterprise Ireland. The agency has ploughed €350,000 into SolarPrint on the basis of a working prototype. Padraic White, the former CEO of the IDA, chairs SolarPrint's advisory board.

Dr Mazhar Bari, a physics graduate from University College Dublin, who founded the company with two colleagues, said: "It is clearly a very difficult funding environment and we were delighted to have such overwhelming support from both our private sector investors and from the Irish government."

The global market for cheap, effective solar-powered batteries is enormous and scientists across the world are racing to produce the first mass-producible, cost-effective solar cells that can transform sunlight to electricity.

A new type of solar cell was invented in the 1990s using an organic dye to absorb light.

Dr Bari's breakthrough was to create a semi-liquid solar cell material that is easy to work with and cheap to produce. He patented his idea last year and joined forces with Roy Horgan, a former banker, and Andre Fernon, who worked in private equity, to form SolarPrint last summer. If the company succeeds in rolling out solar panels for a mass market, it could revolutionise energy usage. Solar cells sandwiched between plastic film can be integrated into goods such as cameras, hair dryers and shaving gadgets. Computer and phone equipment can effectively be charged in daylight.

The dye-sensitised solar cells can draw light energy indoors, or under cloud. On a more ambitious scale, the cells can be sandwiched between glass to transform windows into electricity generators.

The firm intends to focus its solar technology specifically on mobile phones in the developing world.

Source: Irish Independent