Annual Report 2011 (5.07 MB, PDF-File) - Oerlikon

10.0
Research and
development
In 2011, Oerlikon made significant investments to further refine
its products and services and develop groundbreaking new
technologies and products.
In 2011, expenditures for research and development (R&D)
totaled CHF 213 million. R&D expenditures as a percentage of
sales amounted to 5 % in 2011 (2010: 7 %), remaining at the
consistently high level of the past few years. The Group employs
1 200 engineers and scientists across the world whose activities
are dedicated to creating innovative products and solutions
for Oerlikon customers. These professionals focus on developing
solutions that help decrease operating costs, increase
production efficiency, lessen the environmental impact of production
and, of course, improve the performance of products.
In short, Oerlikon helps customers add value and gain competitive
advantage.
Focusing on long-term customer benefits
Oerlikon Textile’s Autocoro 8 is the world’s first rotor spinning
machine with individually driven spinning positions. Because
the Autocoro 8 allows lot changes while running at full production
capacity, piecing downtime is eliminated and much faster
production speeds are possible: spinning mills can produce
up to 25 % more high-quality yarn in the same period of time.
Oerlikon Advanced Technologies’ HEXAGON coating machine,
which is mainly used for Wafer Level Backend Packaging,
boasts throughput that is two to three times faster than competing
systems. HEXAGON not only allows customers to dou-
R&D expenditure as a percentage of sales
R&D %
12
11
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
2007 2008 2009 2010 2011
R&D Sales
Sales CHF
6 000
5 000
4 000
3 000
2 000
1 000
ble or triple the number of chips produced in a given amount of
time, but delivers a reduced footprint, lower operating costs
and higher machine availability compared to other systems.
With its outstanding pump speed, greater flexibility and
robust, reliable design, Oerlikon Vacuum’s new MAGiNTEGRA
turbo-molecular vacuum pump offers up to 80 000 hours of
maintenance-free operation. The unprecedented performance
of the five-axis, magnetically mounted MAGiNTEGRA
is delivered in a compact package that saves enough space
to boost production efficiency – immediately.
Two dramatic improvements were made to Oerlikon Solar’s
thin film silicon technology in 2011. First, Oerlikon Solar
achieved a stabilized module output of 154 Watt-peak (Wp),
which represents a 12.5 % efficiency. Second, the Segment
introduced a new production line for solar modules, which produces
at significantly lower cost than any other line: with the
new ThinFab 140 line, production costs can be lowered to a
record level of just USD 0.50/Wp.
Breakthrough in coating technology
Oerlikon Coating is leading the way into a new era of coating
technology thanks to a pioneering innovation: the newly developed
S3p method (scalable pulsed power plasma). S3p,