Japanese solar PV module manufacturer Solar Frontier, subsidiary of Idemitsu Kosan announced on October 12 to stop the production of photovoltaic modules and planned to stop the production in kunitomi factory around June 2022.
It is reported that the Chinese enterprises, as competitors, has expanded its market share due to the low price of photovoltaic modules, resulting in the continuous severe business situation of Solar Frontier. In the future, the company will meet the demand through the OEM production of overseas module manufacturers such as those from China.
Photovoltaic module is an important part of photovoltaic power generation system and photovoltaic application products. After years of development, China’s domestic photovoltaic module production can fully satisfy their needs instead of relying on importing, and has leading competitiveness in the international market.
In the global market, China’s photovoltaic industry has great advantages in the module sector. According to the statistics of industry consulting body PV InfoLink on the world’s top ten module shippers from 2017 to 2020, the only global competitors of domestic module manufacturers are First Solar of the United States and Hanwha Group of South Korea.
From 2016 to 2020, the module shipments of major global manufacturers continued to increase. In 2020, the module shipment of Longi was about 23.7 GW, an increase of 163.33% year-on-year, secured the leading position in the industry. Meanwhile, the shipments of JinkoSolar and JA Solar also increased by more than 30%.
