Prof. Jackson Liang presented Gaoce’s wafer slicing solution and core tool products at Intersolar Europe 2025 in Munich.  (Photo Credit: TaiyangNews)
Technology

Behind The Wafer: Gaoce’s Role In PV Ingot-To-Wafer Processing

A key player in the intermediate solar manufacturing chain, the company provides a look at its wafer cutting tools, processes, and capacity expansion plans

Shashi Kiran Jonnak

  • Gaoce provides end-to-end wafer cutting solutions, including cropping, squaring, grinding, slicing, and post-slicing treatments 

  • The company has 63 GW of operational wafer cutting capacity and aims to scale up to 102 GW 

  • Gaoce produced over 4.2 billion wafers in 2024 and plans on expanding automation across production stages

In the PV industry value chain, equipment and solutions used between an ingot and a wafer often go unnoticed, despite playing a crucial role. One of the companies showcasing its offerings in this space at Intersolar Europe 2025 was Qingdao Gaoce Technology Co., Ltd. 

Based in China, with subsidiaries across the country, Gaoce is a wafer cutting solution provider that has expanded significantly over the past decade. The company offers not only its own equipment but also OEM services for several wafer and cell manufacturers. 

Alongside its wafer cutting technologies, Gaoce exhibited a range of core equipment: croppers, squarers, grinders, diamond wire saws, electroplated diamond wires, ring wires, and grinding wheels. According to the company, it holds 50% of the global market share in core wafer cutting equipment and ranks among the top 3 diamond wire suppliers. Gaoce also reports an operational wafer cutting capacity of 63 GW. 

Its process workflow includes: 

  1. cropping full-grown ingots using diamond wire, 

  1. squaring smaller ingot sections using diamond wire, 

  1. grinding and polishing the edges of these squared sections using a diamond grinding tool, and 

  1. slicing them into wafers using diamond wire. 

Machines have been developed for each of these steps, and an additional end-of-line solution was also presented at the event, which is used for degumming, singulating, and cleaning the sliced wafers. 

Gaoce lists Adani (India), Kalyon PV, CW Enerji, and Fellow Energy (Turkey), as well as Corning and Qcells (US), among its global customers. 

The wafers produced from its slicing equipment range from 182 mm to 210 mm, including rectangular formats, with thicknesses between 150 µm and 110 µm. Gaoce has announced plans to integrate automation into crystal shaping, slicing, degumming, and sorting processes. 

The company’s total planned capacity is 102 GW, with 63 GW already operational at sites in Yibin, Leshan, and Yancheng. In 2024, Gaoce reported that it produced 4.226 billion wafers.