ES Foundry, the solar cell manufacturer anchoring an industrial hub in Greenwood, South Carolina, has announced it is joining MIT's Initiative for New Manufacturing, committing $1.5 million over three years to a program aimed at modernizing U.S. industrial production through artificial intelligence and advanced automation. The move comes as the company's Greenwood factory, which now supports more than 400 advanced manufacturing jobs, operates a 3 gigawatt solar cell manufacturing platform following a 2 gigawatt expansion completed this past July.
The collaboration, first detailed by Greenville Business Magazine, is described by the two organizations as strengthening U.S. manufacturing broadly, not just ES Foundry's own operations. ES Foundry's engagement with MIT's initiative spans artificial intelligence on the factory floor, automated systems, digital twins, continuous innovation, workforce development, and cybersecurity, according to the announcement. The company says it will work with MIT faculty, researchers and students, as well as manufacturers from other industries, as part of the arrangement.
ES Foundry CEO Alex Zhu said the commitment reflects an investment in making U.S. solar cell manufacturing stronger, and noted that the company operates at commercial scale every day. The collaboration is expected to accelerate ES Foundry's research into AI-driven efficiencies and advanced operating models at the Greenwood plant, which produces high-performance crystalline solar cells in the United States.
Filling a Gap in the Domestic Supply Chain
The Greenwood facility produces monocrystalline bifacial PERC solar cells for utility-scale, commercial, and community solar applications, with cells achieving energy conversion efficiency between 22.8% and 23.6%, according to figures published by ES Foundry. The plant, which spans 400,000 square feet, originally opened in January 2025 after ES Foundry secured a multi-year off-take contract exceeding one gigawatt with an undisclosed solar module manufacturer, as reported by Renewables Now. A month later, ES Foundry signed a multi-year supply agreement to deliver 300 megawatts of Greenwood-produced solar cells to Indianapolis-based module maker Bila Solar, according to a release distributed via PR Newswire.
That kind of domestic cell supply matters because the U.S. solar industry depends on imported solar cells, and the broader U.S. photovoltaic supply chain has a critical gap in solar cell production. While U.S. solar module manufacturing capacity exceeded 65 gigawatts by 2026, domestic production of precursor components like solar cells remained a primary bottleneck in the national clean energy supply chain, according to Canary Media. Federal tax credit rules under the Inflation Reduction Act restrict clean energy tax incentives for manufacturers with Foreign Entity of Concern involvement across ownership, management, debt, or intellectual property, the outlet notes, a policy backdrop that underscores why domestically produced, FEOC-free cells like ES Foundry's carry added value for module makers and developers.
Addressing a Regional Labor Shortage
To address a regional technical skills gap in crystalline solar cell fabrication, ES Foundry partnered with a local community college in Greenwood alongside its engagement with MIT, according to PV Tech. Zhu told the outlet that local workforce training remains critical to supporting current and future plant expansions, pairing near-term hiring needs with the longer-horizon research relationship with MIT.
The Greenwood plant serves as an industrial anchor for an economic center spanning six surrounding counties in upstate South Carolina, per ES Foundry's own account of its facilities. That regional footprint sits alongside a national demand picture: the U.S. Energy Information Administration projected in September that domestic solar power generation will grow 21% in 2026 and 18% in 2027, driven by expanding manufacturing buildouts and data center energy consumption, according to Utility Dive.
Joining a Growing MIT Consortium
MIT President Sally Kornbluth officially launched the Initiative for New Manufacturing in May 2025 as an Institute-wide presidential initiative focused on modernizing U.S. industrial production through AI and advanced automation, according to MIT News. The program is designed to translate university research into practical factory-floor applications. When the initiative launched, its founding corporate consortium members included industrial names such as Amgen, Autodesk, Flextronics, GE Vernova, PTC, Sanofi, and Siemens, Forbes reported at the time, placing ES Foundry's newer participation alongside a roster of established global industrial and technology firms.
ES Foundry was established to produce high-performance crystalline solar cells in the United States, and its collaboration with MIT is framed by both parties as a step toward strengthening that domestic manufacturing base through AI-driven efficiencies and advanced operating models rather than a single-company research project.
