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W W W. M A I N E B I Z . B I Z 15 J U N E 1 , 2 0 1 5 targets and sputtered films, which includes the long metal tubes Soleras makes that serve as the bom- barded targets, is expected to reach $3.2 billion by 2018. at's a 1.3% compounded annual growth rate from 2013, according to BCC Research of Wellesley, Mass. And it's a market where Soleras claims it's a leader in selling sputter targets for high-end applications like the low-emissivity or low-e, energy-efficient architec- tural glass seen in modern skyscrapers, smart glass that can change color and in very large displays. Soleras CEO Jeffrey Edel says the quality of his product, and his company's unusual location, differentiate it. Most competitors are located in high-tech areas like Silicon Valley or large cities around the world. "It's neat because we're in Biddeford," says Edel. "It wouldn't be as special if we were in California." In fact, it's easy to drive by Soleras, tucked behind the Biddeford Municipal Airport sign at the edge of that city. But the sputtering equipment and compo- nents company is well known to international, high- end glass makers, to whom it has been selling since 1968. In fact, some 75% of its less than $100 million in sales are overseas, mostly in China and Europe, with no sales in Maine, but the remaining 25% in the United States. Edel expects sales, which are growing 10% to 20% annually, to hit $100 million by 2016. ough founded in 1968, Soleras Advanced Coatings assumed its current form in 2012, when Radnor, Pa.-based private equity firm Element Partners purchased Soleras Ltd. and combined it with Bekaert Advanced Coatings of Belgium. Both companies develop equipment and rotatable targets for thin-film sputter deposition. e acquisition of Bekaert's coating operations included its facilities in Belgium, China and Wisconsin. While sputtering technology has been used for decades, mainly in the electronics market in items like integrated circuits, it now is being applied to disk drives, advanced displays and low-e glass. e energy segment accounted for close to 29% of the total market in 2013. Despite rising dollar figures, unit sales are expected to drop almost 1% to 955,000 units in 2018, mostly because the individual units are larger than earlier products, and thus can be cut into smaller pieces. "e drop is due to the trend toward the use of fewer but larger targets, reflecting a change of product mix related to the growth of applications such as flat panel displays, optical coatings and solar cells," BCC Research analyst Margareth Gagliardi noted when she released her research report in May 2014. For Soleras, the focus now is on low-e architec- tural glass coatings. Edel says Europe and China are moving more quickly than the United States to adopt the energy-saving coated glass in both com- mercial and residential uses. China is the company's fastest-growing market. While low-e glass has a market penetration rate of 80% in developed countries like Germany, the rate in China is still only about 11%, according to QYResearch Reports of Albany, N.Y. e market researcher expects China's demand for low-e glass to grow 23.5% com- pounded annually from 2014-2017. China's low-e glass production rose to 134 million square meters in 2013 from six million square meters in 2005, and is expected to rise to 152 million square meters in 2014. What is sputtering? Sputtering, also known as physical vapor deposi- tion, is a process that evenly deposits very thin films across a substrate, such as glass. Soleras makes the components used during the sputtering process, known as round or rotary sputtering targets, metal tubes that can be longer than 12 feet and around six inches in diameter. e company produces sputter- ing targets with different metals, then sells them to glass makers for coating their glass. Soleras uses several different methods to make its sputtering targets, but most commonly it uses spraying and casting. Spraying involves accelerating droplets of molten metal wire or metal powder through a plasma gun that hit the sputtering target. e droplets flat- ten upon impact to coat it. Casting involves melting a metal and pouring it into a mold that contains the sputtering target. e coating is placed in the space between the outside casting and the target, coating it to the depth desired by the customer. Coating materi- als include silicon, aluminum or zinc alloy. e tradeoff between the two technologies is that spraying is lower cost, but more unwanted particles get onto the target, while casting has fewer stray particles but costs more. Spraying can't be used in the computer display industry because of the issue with extraneous particles. "What makes Soleras special is our capability to cast," says Jason Bergquist, director of operational excellence at the company. "We have two casting units here. is is all proprietary technology that we build." C O N T I N U E D O N F O L L OW I N G PA G E » E S TA B L I S H E D 1 8 7 1 perkinsthompson.com PT.business.indd 1 5/13/15 9:00 AM

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