VON ARDENNE develops and manufactures advanced vacuum coating equipment for the deposition of ultra-thin functional layers on materials such as glass, metal strip, wafers and polymer films. In this article, we take an exclusive look at the company and its latest product, XEA|nova – set to be introduced at this year’s Intersolar Europe.
The German family-owned company VON ARDENNE’s key technologies are magnetron sputtering and electron beam evaporation and it holds more than 750 patents worldwide. The company was founded in 1991 as a spin-off of the former Manfred von Ardenne Research Institute in Dresden, Germany. A consequence of this was that the expertise in plasma and electron beam technologies that had been acquired over decades could be used and developed further.
The company owes its name to Manfred von Ardenne, a highly gifted, visionary and dedicated scientist and inventor born in 1907. His contribution to inventions such as the radio receiver, the television, and the scanning electron microscope is extraordinary. He held approximately 600 patents in radio and television technology, electron microscopy, nuclear plasma, and medical technologies and was the author of countless books and publications -without holding a degree or even a high school diploma. It was thanks to his farsightedness and hard work that he became such a famous scientist.
Today, VON ARDENNE focuses on reliable technologies to deposit thin layers on large areas and very large substrates homogeneously and in nanometer and micrometer scale to realise specific functional behaviours for the advanced products of its customers. VON ARDENNE is constantly identifying and analysing market trends throughout the industries. In the last years, the market for energy generation, energy saving and lately also the energy storage industry strengthened and broadened its technology portfolio.
