Sharp plans $3.2B combination LCD, solar plant

By Colleen Taylor, Contributing Editor -- Electronic News, 7/31/2007

Electronics titan Sharp Corp. today announced plans to build on the same site a new 10th-generation (10G) LCD panel plant and thin-film solar cell plant in Sakai City, Japan.

According to Sharp, TFT LCDs and thin-film solar cells are based on the same thin-film technologies and can share materials and utilities.

The $3.2 billion (380 billion Japanese yen) plant will use a vertically integrated business model similar to the one used at Sharp's Kameyama plant. Sharp said that in addition to infrastructure-related facilities and production equipment manufacturers, a number of leading material manufacturers such as glass substrate and color filter makers will be invited to set up plants adjacent to Sharp's new LCD panel plant within this manufacturing complex, sharing gas and electricity.

Sharp said that the LCD panel plant will be the first in the world to use 10G glass substrates, the world's largest size at 2850-mm by 3050-mm, 60 percent larger than the 8th-generation substrates used at the 8G Kameyama plant. According to Sharp, the 10G glass substrate will yield six LCD panels in the 60-inch class, eight panels in the 50-inch class, or 15 panels in the 40-inch class.

Construction is slated to start in November, with production operations scheduled to start by March 2010.

Meanwhile, the solar cell plant will focus on mass production of thin-film solar cells. Plans call for a production volume of around 1,000 MW (1 million kW) per year for the thin-film solar cells to be manufactured at the facility. Operations are slated to begin at same time as the LCD panel plant.