Improvement of transparent conducting materials by metallic grids on transparent conductive oxides

•Conductivity improvement over two orders of magnitude at small transmittance loss•Limited performance of single material transparent conductors surpassed•The figure of merit was improved by more than a factor of 50

The trade-off between transparency and conductivity in transparent conductors used in optoelectronic devices is a major bottleneck towards higher device performances. Grid deposition on transparent conductive oxides was demonstrated using electrochemical deposition, which has the advantage of a high aspect ratio of 0.45 and the possibility to use very narrow lines. The sheet conductivity was increased more than two orders of magnitude at a transmittance loss of only a few percent. The figure of merit as defined by Haacke was improved with a factor of more than 50.