ABB, Chinese suppliers lead Indian solar inverter market in 2017

Swiss-based power and automation group ABB Ltd (VTX:ABBN) led the Indian solar inverter market in 2017 with a share of 19%, Mercom India said last week.

It is followed by Sungrow Power Supply (SHE:300274) with a market share of 16%, and Huawei Technologies (SHE:002502) with 13% as 2017 saw rapid increase of inverter supply from China.

Toshiba Mitsubishi-Electric Industrial Systems Corp (TMEIC) of Japan and Germany's SMA Solar Technology (ETR:S92) also supplied over 1 GW of inverters in India in 2017, Mercom said.

According to the firm's India Solar Market Leaderboard 2018 report, the top 10 solar inverter suppliers accounted for over 85% of all shipments in India last year, delivering around 11 GW of inverters. Overall, over 30 inverter suppliers are catering to India's solar market, which in 2018 is expected to approximate 8 GW-9 GW and speed up from 2019.

"Inverter suppliers enjoyed a record year supplying to India in 2017, but since module prices have not moved much since Q3 of 2017, they also experienced strong price pressure from developers who are bidding aggressively to win projects," commented Mercom Capital Group chief executive Raj Prabhu, adding that if the recent Chinese solar policy changes become effective, falling Chinese module and inverter prices could put extra pressure on other suppliers.

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