Plextronics Inc., a maker of printed solar, lighting and other organic electronics, has announced the completion of its $14 million series B-1 financing round, led by a $12 million investment by Solvay North American Investments LLC. This was Solvay’s second investment in Plextronics in three years; Solvay is a member of the Brussels, Belgium-based international chemical and pharmaceutical group Solvay Group and now the largest minority shareholder in Plextronics. Based in Pittsburgh, Plextronics was founded in 2002 as a spinout from Carnegie Mellon University and the conductive polymer technology developed there by Dr. Richard McCullough. “The funding from this round will enable us to continue to advance our lighting and solar products – namely our organic light-emitting diode [OLED] and organic photovoltaic [OPV] materials and inks – so that we can scale these products to meet the customer and industry demand we are seeing,” said Plextronics President and CEO Andy Hannah. Several of Plextronics’ existing private investors also contributed to this funding round; the last round Plextronics completed was a $25 million series B financing in 2007. For more information, visit: www.plextronics.com