Tagged: natcore

Solar firm Natcore Technology cut the ribbon on its new R&D center at Eastman Business Park Friday.

The official opening of the million-dollar clean room consolidates Natcore's R&D work in Rochester.

But getting funding for a solar manufacturing line remains a challenge.

Executives from foreign solar companies are descending on Rochester over the next couple of weeks, to hear a pitch from Natcore Technology.

“What we’re saying is, ‘If you want our technology, you have to take a hard look at it here,’ ” says Natcore CEO Chuck Provini.

Natcore has a small research facility at Rochester’s Eastman Business Park. For about a year, the company has been looking for money to establish a much bigger manufacturing presence in Rochester. But Natcore says talks with federal and regional officials have yielded no funding.

Now, Natcore is turning to solar companies from India, China and Italy for a possible joint venture that would make flexible solar cells on equipment that once made Kodak film.

But there’s a catch.

“It’s their money,” Provini says of the foreign companies. “And if they say, ‘Chuck, we really enjoyed the visit, but no,’ [then] we’re a business ... and we’ll go where we can best help save the world, not just a country.”

New Jersey-based solar company Natcore Technology is establishing a research center at Kodak's Eastman Business Park.

That's the word from Natcore ahead of a meeting today with local officials.

The solar company says it's consolidating its research work in Rochester. The new center will initially be staffed by eight people.

Remember that press conference in February that talked about the possibility of setting up a solar cell manufacturing line at Kodak’s Eastman Business Park?

Remember the 2,000 to 4,000 jobs that officials said the partnership with Natcore Technology would create?

Well, turns out the key ingredient to that prospective success story - an $8 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) - did not come through.

Despite the setback, however, Kodak and Natcore officials say they’re still working to make the project a reality.