Andreas Gombert on concentrating photovoltaics

Andreas Gombert is chief technology officer of Concentrix Solar (Freiburg, Germany), a division of the Soitec Group.

Concentrix was founded in 2005 as a spin-off company of Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy (ISE) Systems. Concentrix Solar further developed the concentrator photovoltaic (CPV) technology generated from research at Fraunhofer ISE and brought it from the laboratory to market-ready products and advanced it into series production. Under the name FLATCON®, Concentrix offers turnkey commercial CPV power plants. The company recently joined the Desertec Industrial Initiative as Associated Partner.

In August 2010 Concentrix announced that it would inaugurate its first power facility in South Africa at the Aquila Private Game Reserve in Touwsrivier on September 1, 2010. This is the initial step in developing large-scale solar power projects in South Africa. In 2010 the company also inaugurated Concentrix Solar, Inc., its North American subsidiary, based in San Diego.

Gombert studied photoengineering at the University of Applied Sciences of Cologne, Germany, and optics at the University of Strasbourg, France. He started his professional career at the Fraunhofer Institute for Physical Measurement Techniques, where he worked in integrated optics. In 1998 he recieved his Ph.D. from the University of Strasbourg. He is currently also a lecturer at the Univ. of Freiburg. He spent 12 years at Fraunhofer ISE and was the head of the Materials Research and Applied Optics department.

He has presented more than 20 papers at SPIE symposia, and serves as chair of the Photonics for Solar Energy Systems at SPIE Photonics Europe.

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