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GREENSBORO — RF Micro Devices could soon become a “monster” player in the quest to turn sunlight into gold.

The microchip maker said Monday it has developed a way to manufacture cells that convert sunlight into energy that could lead to some of the cheapest and most efficient solar cells yet.

The game-changer is that RF, which makes and ships about 2 million semiconductor chips for wireless communications every day, will be able to make solar cells without modifying its existing equipment.

“It’s monster,” said David Christensen, a U.S. government engineer who specializes in renewable energy.
“They’re immediately a major player.”

Plenty of companies are close to developing good technology, but few have RF Micro’s hundreds of millions of dollars in plants and equipment to produce products.

“There are only a few other companies that are actually making or selling these kinds of chips that I am aware of,” said Christensen, a senior licensing executive with the federal National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Colo.

“RFMD is right up in their class or has the potential to be once they actually start making and selling.”

“It is a major accomplishment in the fact that we are on a two-year program to develop what we believe will be the world’s most efficient photovoltaic cell,” said Jerry Neal, the executive vice president for strategic development and a co-founder of the company.

“The exciting thing about it is we’re able  to use our existing equipment that we use to make semiconductors to make cells.”

RF is already a major Greensboro employer with 1,400 workers. The company has suffered a downturn and is showing strong recovery in revenues, but it is looking for ways to protect itself from fluctuations in the wireless markets.

It wants to make chips — using the same chemicals it uses for communication devices — to convert the sun’s light into electric power. The company said it wants to create components called photovoltaic cells that are also among the most efficient in the world, meaning they can harvest the most energy from sunlight.

The most efficient cell can convert 40 percent of sunlight’s energy into electricity. But RF, through its cooperative agreement with the lab, wants to do better than that.

Scores of companies are working on this or similar technology because the U.S. Department of Energy, which owns the NRE Lab, wants the nation’s businesses to develop solar energy that is as affordable as conventional electric sources by 2015.

“RF has positioned themselves to sell a first-in-class product that would have the RF name behind it,” Christensen said. “If you were in business you could say, 'Jeez, we (can) count on this company.’ ”

Christensen’s lab works by contract with corporations that want to do a “mind meld,” as he describes it, where green energy researchers from the government work with private scientists on specific projects.

RF says it wants to start mass producing its products by 2012.

The kind of cell it plans to make would most likely be used in solar generators that use mirrors or lenses to concentrate sunlight in a small area. They tend to work best in areas with the clearest, brightest skies.

“If the whole package (with optics) can get down to a low enough price potential, the market’s gargantuan,” Christensen said.

Contact Richard M. Barron at 373-7375 or richard.barron@news-record.com