Sharp Reduces Production and Stops Solar Cell Exports

Ne21 (Reporter Sunnie) Nikkan Kogyo Shimbun reported on the 21st that Sharp, a Japanese solar cell faucet, plans to rectify solar cell production in Japan due to fierce price competition with overseas manufacturers and continued deterioration in profitability due to the rise in Japanese yen prices. The system aims to turn solar battery business into profit in 2012 (April 2012 - March 2013).

According to reports, Sharp's thin-film solar cell production line (capacity: 160MW per year) at the Katsuragi Plant (Gejo City, Nara Prefecture) will temporarily suspend production, and its crystalline germanium solar cell production line (with an annual capacity of 550MW) in the same plant will also carry out production cuts. In the future, Sharp's solar cell production will be concentrated in the (terra) industry, and the crystalline solar cell required for overseas markets will be purchased from Taiwan, China, and South Korea as ODMs. According to reports, Sharp's above measures are also equivalent to essentially stopping the export of solar cells from Japan to overseas sales.

Sharp's annual domestic solar cell capacity in Japan totaled 1,070 MW. Sharp recently announced that the company’s solar cell business losses from April to December 2011 amounted to 14.758 billion yen, and Sharp estimated that the 2011 solar battery business will lose 24 billion yen in 2011 (April 2011-March 2012). .