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| Author | InfoLink |
| Updated | October 13, 2017 |
Leading Taiwanese PV cell companies - Gintech, NSP, and Solartech, announced on Oct. 14 the suspension of common stock transactions on Oct. 16 and they are expecting to announce breaking news soon. Although there’s no official confirmation yet, what the three companies will announce later on may not be just about forming an alliance but actual merger issues since the suspension of stock transactions is involved.
Rumors had it that Tainergy is also in the alliance but the company didn’t suspend the common stock transactions simultaneously. According to the current news speculation, the new company may be led by NSP or Gintech. There are also rumors about each company will conduct its own procurement, sales, and new businesses. However, it’s still not clear yet. The three companies may not start to plan things until they announce the news.
Currently, Gintech, NSP, and Solartech have a total cell capacity of 4.5GW, of which 1.5GW is overseas capacity and 1.7GW is PERC capacity. If the three companies do merge, they will become Taiwan’s largest cell manufacturer. According to the understanding, they will launch the green energy funding in Taiwan, boosting the new company’s capital to more than NT$ 20 billion. Following the expansion, it’s expecting that there will be new commercial advantages for bargaining and sales.
Taiwanese Cell Capacity;Unit:GW
Although Gintech, NSP, and Solartech are all cell manufacturers, but they have different strategies. Gintech uses the overseas capacities as its advantage and successfully turned losses around. Gintech is also one of the few companies that have wafer capacities (its subsidiary is Utech Solar) in Taiwan; NSP announced to focus on mono-Si PERC cell production and will be aggressively working on module development and power plants; and Solartech is one of the few companies that focus on multi-Si PERC cell production. It also began to put efforts in Europe and India in the early stage.
Overall, the three companies have their own characteristics and there are possibilities for them to be complementary. However, Taiwanese cell makers have suffered from losses for a long time, meaning there will be more sales pressures. Therefore, more clear actions and strategies are needed to know the strategic direction and the benefits brought by the new company (or the alliance).