Tuesday, March 9, 2010

"Solar Boom Coming; But First, “Widespread Company Failures'" (ESLR; ENER)

Well there's a cheery little headline by Mr. Savitz.
From Tech Trader Daily:

For solar enthusiasts, a new report from Lux Research offers both good news and bad news.

The Boston-based research firm contends that the global solar market will expand to $77 billion by 2015, growing at a 23% compounded rate from an estimated $39 billion in 2010. The industry, Lux analyst Ted Sullivan contends, will “wildly beat” current long-term expectations for the industry, with 2015 shipments increasing to an estimated 26.4 GW, from 9.3 GW in 2010.

So that’s the good news.

The problem is, before the industry enjoys the fruits of that growth, it’s going to have to suffer.

Sullivan sees a period of significant over-capacity ahead, and expects to see :”violent changes” in the industry, with “widespread company failures throughout the value chain.” He contends that the “continuing glut threatens low-quality and high-cost players alike,” and particularly singles out Evergreen Solar (ESLR) and the Uni-Solar brand from Energy Conversion Devices (ENER) as companies at risk, due to “high operating costs and insufficient scale.”>>>MORE