As I've alluded to here before - see not yet archived blog from 4th Dec - Two views on forward solar prices - boom or bust? - I have long suspected that the good news story about thin-film solar is at least a little overdone.

So I was intrigued to read this piece on Red Herring which echoed my prejudices at much higher volume !

To quote;

". . . researchers have been working on thin films for years. Thin-film solar has a long history of disappointments, due to manufacturing difficulties and reliability problems, among other things."

It seems that the source of this renewed interest in thin-film solar was nanosolar - a newish thin film company getting extensive pr at least partly because Sergey Brin and Larry Page of google invest in it.

Anyway, the thin-film sceptical article continues . . .

"Nanosolar is one of a number of thin-film startups that claim new materials and manufacturing technologies could solve the problems. The facilities are a chance for Nanosolar to prove itself, and the viability of thin films. So far only a few thin-film companies have begun manufacturing, including First Solar, Energy Conversion Devices’ Uni-Solar, and Global Solar Energy, and they are still at low levels."

I don't think there's much doubt that thin film is no magic bullet. It is as yet only 5 - 10% of the global solar pv market and there are two main reasons for that;

i) the trade off in reduced costs from a reduced input of silcon is offset by lower efficiencies - perhaps 6 - 9% v. 15% for hard solar panels and customers like power.
ii) demand still isn't great enough for a continuous manufacturing run of thin film.