Dr. Yash R. Puri is Executive Vice President and CFO of Magnolia Solar. He is also a co-founder of Magnolia Solar Inc., a company developing a thin-film solar panel technology using nano-engineered materials for high efficiency. He is also a co-founder of Magnolia Optical Technologies, Inc. He is responsible for overseeing Magnolia financial operations. Yash has many years of photovoltaic technology and applications experience both in the private sector and in the academia.
Dr. Puri also brings experience in startup environment and growth management to the Magnolia team. Previously Dr. Puri was VP of Finance for GT Equipment Technologies, Inc., a privately held equipment manufacturer serving the semiconductor and the photovoltaic industries. This company is presently known as GT Solar, Inc., a leader in photovoltaic equipment manufacturing. He helped this high technology startup, formed in 1994, to grow to revenue of about $20 million. The company won many rewards and much recognition; it was a New England finalist in the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award. In this position, he was actively involved in running a rapidly growing high-technology business, and he successfully negotiated the first major line of credit with a major bank, established an audit relationship with one of the national accounting firms, established a foreign sales corporation, implemented a R&D credit program to reduce tax liabilities, and established company-wide management software to integrate manufacturing and financial operations to position the company for future public offering.
Dr. Puri is also a Professor of Finance at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell. Dr. Puri was the Principal Investigator of a photovoltaic commercialization project as well as several other grants, and has been a director of a technology commercialization program for engineering students, Chairman of the Management and Finance Department, and acting Associate Dean. In these positions, he successfully managed several externally funded projects and developed many years of experience in technology and growth management.
Dr. Puri holds a B.S. in Physics, a M.S. in Solid State Physics, and a M.B.A. from the University of Delhi. He also holds a M.B.A. in Finance and a D.B.A. in International Business from Indiana University, Bloomington. He has published many papers and has made numerous conference presentations.
Magnolia Solar was founded in 2008 to develop and commercialize revolutionary new thin film solar cell technologies that employ nanostructured materials and designs. Magnolia's transformational approach to thin film solar cells is based upon breakthrough discoveries in nanostructured solar cell design and optical coatings engineering. With this approach, Magnolia is aiming to dramatically enhance the power-generating capability of photovoltaic systems by developing low cost, thin film technology that delivers unprecedented levels of electrical energy per unit area. Magnolia is developing a variety of thin film solar cell products with enhanced performance for both civilian and military applications, as we believe that different material technologies can service distinct niches within the solar photovoltaic market.
Nanostructured materials enable new device concepts that can radically enhance the operation of traditional semiconductor structures. Magnolia has unique insights into these advanced device designs and intellectual property associated with the nanomaterials necessary to build them. Both higher current and voltage outputs are expected from thin film solar cells that combine Magnolia's exclusive material structure with nanoengineered optical coatings that can scatter normally incident light laterally into the device. Magnolia's technology also has the ability to capture a larger part of the solar spectrum to produce high efficiency solar cells, and incorporates a unique nanostructure-based antireflection coating technology to further increase the solar cell's efficiency, thereby reducing the cost per watt. Magnolia Solar technology targets electrical power generation applications, such as power for electrical grids and distributed power applications ranging from commercial and residential lighting to specialized military applications.