Leading CdTe thin-film producer First Solar is undergoing a mid-year restructuring that includes cost cutting activities that should generate a US$2 billion balance sheet cushion against changing solar business dynamics and a looming revenue and shipment hole facing the company in 2017.
With First Solar’s revenue and shipment guidance unchanged and basically locked-in for 2016, despite solar industry dynamics becoming increasingly fluid, filling demand for 3GW of thin-film module capacity in 2017 has become a priority for management as a rather large hole in bookings is proving difficult to fill.
Leading CdTe thin-film producer First Solar is undertaking a further round of restructuring that targets its EPC and O&M operations after its decision to shutdown its TetraSun crystalline silicon operations in Malaysia in early July.
Leading CdTe thin-film producer First Solar said it had secured a total of 121MW of community solar projects in the US with around 41MW (DC) under construction by EPC firm M+W Energy.
Leading CIS thin-film producer Solar Frontier said it had completed on schedule the largest PV power plant in Nagasaki Prefecture that resides next to Nagasaki airport runway.
PV Tech’s preliminary analysis of global PV manufacturing capacity expansion announcements in June, clearly demonstrate a significant slowdown in recent months.
Struggling solar PV thin-film firm Hanergy Thin Film Power Group said its parent company Hanergy Holding Group had proposed a deferred payment deal on overdue debts totalling US$360 million and interest penalty payments that topped US$25 million at the end of 2015.
Capital expenditure (capex) from solar PV manufacturers is set to decline during the first half of 2017, as the industry adjusts to the excess of new capacity having come online during 2015 and 2016, according to the latest findings in the PV Manufacturing & Technology Quarterly report, released July 2016.
Solarion’s solar module M210 is a c Si-glass-foil module with a front side mounted junction box and is factory-laminated onto a piece of roofing membrane.
In this week's Movers & Shakers segment, PV Tech examines new US solar employment initiatives, new up-and-coming technology and industry policy debates as well as career moves by influential individuals.