Passivated emitter and rear cells (PERC) are considered to be the next generation of industrial-type screen-printed silicon solar cells. Deposition methods for rear passivation layers have to meet both the high-throughput and low-cost requirements of the PV industry in combination with high-quality surface passivation properties. In this paper, we evaluate and optimise a novel deposition technique for AlOx passivation layers by applying an inductively coupled plasma (ICP) plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposition (PECVD) process. The ICP AlOx deposition process enables high deposition rates up to 5 nm/s as well as excellent surface recombination velocities below 10 cm/s after firing. A fixed negative charge of -4 x 10(12) cm(-2) is measured for ICP AlOx single layers with an interface state density of 11.0 x 10(11) eV(-1) cm(-2) at midgap position. When applied to PERC solar cells the ICP AlOx layer is capped with a PECVD SiNy layer. We achieve independently confirmed conversion efficiencies of up to 20.1% for large-area (15.6 x 15.6 cm(2)) PERC solar cells with screen-printed metal contacts and ICP AlOx/SiNy rear side passivation on standard boron-doped Czochralski-grown silicon wafers. The internal quantum efficiency reveals an effective rear surface recombination velocity S-rear of (90 +/- 30) cm/s and an internal rear reflectance R-b of (91 +/- 1)% which demonstrates the excellent rear surface passivation of the ICP AlOx/SiNy layer stack. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.