VentureBeat

One of the solar photovoltaic industry’s biggest problems right now is a lack of polysilicon needed to make their solar cells. Supply shortages aren’t expected to ease up for another couple years; meanwhile, those who do have solar-grade silicon to sell are making money hand-over-fist.

6N Silicon wants to join the fray with a proprietary manufacturing process of its own, which is capable of improving low-grade silicon enough to be of use in solar (but not enough for semiconductors). Its processes are derived from the metals industry, which works in much larger volumes than silicon manufacturers have ever needed to.

If 6N can live up to its promises, there could be some serious pain down the road for the other new silicon-manufacturing plants already being built to satisfy demand. An oversupply is projected within a couple years, which would only be aggravated by a lower-priced offering such as what 6N is promising.

That might sound like great news for the makers of solar cells, the excess supply could hurt in other ways: A sudden burst of low-cost silicon might produce an excess of cheap silicon-based cells. That will pull the carpet from beneath manufacturers that have so far relied on being able to charge a premium, and likely knock some players out of the game.

Other technologies might reduce the amount of silicon needed. Applied Materials is working on a thin-film silicon cell that uses a fraction of the silicon usually needed, while a host of competing non-silicon technologies based on various metals, inks and nanomaterials are also in development. Thin-film cell makers like First Solar and Nanosolar are already on the market, but regular silicon photovoltaics still capture the vast majority of sales.

As for 6N, it hasn’t yet lived up to its hopes of making solar-grade silicon without using the waste matter from semiconductor manufacturing. However, it’s likely to be making its silicon in quantity by 2010, the year projected for the beginning of the supply shift.

The $20 million funding was provided by Good Energies, along with Yaletown Venture Partners and Ventures West. The company, based in Missuaga, Ontario, also recently took on a new CEO from the metallurgical industry.

Alder Biopharmaceuticals, a Bothell, Wash., developer of antibody drugs, raised $40 million in a third funding round. Investors included Delphi Ventures, TPG Biotech, Sevin Rosen Funds, Ventures West, H.I.G. Ventures, and WRF Capital.

Alder develops antibody-based drugs for inflammation and autoimmune disease. The company’s lead candidate, ALD518, is currently in clinical trials as a treatment for rheumatoid arthritis and cancer, although neither Alder’s Web site nor its statement disclose when the drug began human tests.

Alder’s work is also noticeable because it produces its antibodies in genetically modified yeast cells, a new manufacturing technique that the company claims is faster and cheaper than traditional genetic-engineering methods involving mammalian cells. Not only does production in yeast allow companies to sidestep the need for expensive patent licenses that cover traditional methods, Alder claims it can speed the development process to months from years, making it possible to evaluate a much wider range of antibody candidates.

Alder also claims that ALD518 is the first full-length functioning antibody to be made on an industrial scale in yeast. For an additional information on the merits of yeast-based antibody manufacture, see our previous coverage of Adimab, a startup developing its own yeast-production system for similar reasons. If you’re a technical-detail junkie, don’t miss the discussion in comments.

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Viigo, a Toronto company that offers a convenient mobile phone application that lets you subscribe to news, entertainment and other content, has raised $6.4 million in financing.

Viigo competes head to head with Freerange. Both companies offer what is called an RSS Reader, or a technology that allows you to subscribe easily to the articles produced by some 5,000 “channels,” ranging from publications from the New York Times to the niche blog for pet lovers.

Both companies are also praised for their ease of use. They let you download article feeds for offline use, so that you can read your favorite articles on flights, for example, where there is no wireless coverage.

Some users give Freerange the edge in ratings for performance, in part because it allows full-feed downloads, including photos, for offline reading. Viigo, by contrast, strips out photos and other non-text files to save you from extra data charges, and also because it costs more for Viigo to deliver. [Update: However, this is a minor inconvenience: When you open the documents, Viigo calls up those stripped-out files so that you see them. The only time you won't see them is when you're say, on a plane, where there's no wireless coverage. Viigo offers its service for free, whereas Freerange offers its service free for only the first ten feeds.]

Viigo has more up its sleeve. Over the next few months, the company plans to unveil a more interactive platform that lets people do things like search their surroundings with maps, find restaurants, buy tickets and other activities, according to chief executive Mark Ruddock

Viigo’s application works on Research In Motion (Blackberry) and Windows Mobile phones.

The company had 175,000 people activate its service this year, and 75 percent of those came in the last four months, Ruddock said. He wouldn’t specify how many active users the company has, but said it is in the “mid to high tens of thousands.”

Viigo doesn’t make money right now, but will also be unveiling an advertising platform soon, allowing publishers to sign up and insert advertising into the application screen.

The funding was led by Ventures West, one of Canada’s largest private venture capital companies. The company previously raised an angel round of financing, and said the total raised is $4.6 million.