TOPCon has replaced PERC as the mainstream solar cell technology, supported by large-scale equipment upgrades
BC cells are emerging as the next frontier, though still in early development with limited disclosure
Equipment innovations focus on higher throughput, yield, and lower CapEx and OpEx, while policies in markets like India are creating new opportunities for local equipment supply
In light of the recent geopolitical developments, the importance of terms like ‘resilience’ and ‘self-sufficiency’ is growing in countries around the world. Add ‘energy independence’ and ‘energy transition’, and they gain a whole new meaning. Countries that used to be importers are now looking to create their own manufacturing ecosystems from the ground up.
Specific to the world of solar PV, setting up local manufacturing means establishing new fabs. The spotlight is firmly on the technologies, tools, and materials that enable both high efficiency and cost-effective production. Production equipment plays a significant role here, which – apart from influencing decisions on the choice of technology and material utilization – also commands a big chunk of capital expenditure (CapEx). And over the recent years, equipment makers have made impressive progress in this context. Along with improved yields and equipment uptime, reduced CapEx has resulted in a significant boost in the cost-performance ratio.
Indeed, there have been fascinating developments in the production equipment segment. The first line of improvement is in throughput. There has been a significant increase in the production capacities of several tools used in cell production lines over a relatively short time. Some production equipment configurations for specific processes can now support more than 1 GW production capacity with a single tool. While this speaks strongly in favor of CapEx reduction, the tools are also optimized to reduce material consumption and improve the yield and uptime, all of which help to lower operational expenditure (OpEx).
Production equipment is also key to the technology’s progress. They are the first step when considering a new technology. From time to time, production equipment makers have been responding to the dynamic requirements of cell makers to optimize existing processes and develop new cell architectures. One can see clear proof in the successful rollout of TOPCon, which has largely replaced PERC, backed by close to terawatt capacity. A few manufacturers are already producing back contact (BC) on a commercial and multi-gigawatt scale, with several more preparing for a transition to BC. All this was only possible with the support of the equipment segment.
TaiyangNews has been covering key developments in the production equipment specific to respective cell architectures through exclusive technology reports. These include several editions of technology reports on PERC, TOPCon, and heterojunction (HJT). The most recent was the TaiyangNews Cell & Module Technology Trends 2025, published in May 2025.
However, the coverage of the production equipment segment has primarily focused on key developments facilitating a particular technology. In order to cover the developments associated with production equipment, TaiyangNews has also been publishing market surveys on production equipment for state-of-the-art cell technologies. The mid-2022 survey was the last to cover PERC. TOPCon became the central topic of development for equipment makers soon after. And indeed, very quickly, but strongly, TOPCon replaced PERC as the mainstream technology. This was reflected in the TaiyangNews Market Survey on Solar Cell Production Equipment 2023, published in mid-2023.
During that time, albeit modest, the last round of investments was happening in PERC. And the majority of expansions taking place at that time were based on TOPCon, making it the topic of our previous survey.
By now, TOPCon has not only become the industry’s workhorse, but it has also quickly become representative of overcapacity. While this is challenging, the equipment supply wing is turning this into an opportunity by introducing new and innovative solutions to make the technology even more competitive. A few leading solar markets, such as India, have announced policies to incubate domestic production, which is opening up fresh business avenues for equipment makers. On top, the industry is already evaluating the BC architecture, which requires considerable optimization in production, presenting new opportunities for toolmakers. However, the BC stream is not quite open, and its development is mainly led through close cooperation. Thus, equipment vendors are wary of sharing the detailed specifications of their tools openly. Consequently, this TaiyangNews Market Survey on Cell Production Equipment, again, details the recent developments in processing tools used all along TOPCon cell fabs. We do, however, thanks to a few tool suppliers coming forward to share the process intricacies and solutions for BC, elaborate on the topic in the survey as and when some information is available. We also bring PERC into the context, especially when the tools are based on the same platform and for comparison.
The text is an excerpt from TaiyangNews’ latest report on Solar Cell Production Equipment 2025, which can be downloaded for free here.
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