LONGi to supply $600 million in modules to the U.S. market

The contract, worth around $600 million, was signed on July 17 with an un-named U.S. “major ground power plant developer”. Under the terms, monocrystalline modules will be shipped over a four-year period, between 2019 and 2022.

The Chinese PV manufacturer’s wholly-owned subsidiary Longi Leye Photovoltaic Technology Co. Ltd. will supply the modules.

“This contract is a major sales contract, and the signing of this contract is beneficial to LONGi,” said the company in a filing to the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

According to LONGi’s website, the company currently has a module manufacturing capacity of 6.5 GW. Despite the changes to China’s PV policy, the company will progress as planned with its investment in a $300 million 5 GW PV module plant, and a tripling of wafer capacity to 45 GW by 2020, Mr. Zhen Guo Li, General Manager, Director told pv magazine at last month’s Intersolar Europe/Smarter E event in Munich, Germany.

He added that while LONGi’s overseas module sales accounted for just 10% in 2017, this figure will grow to 30% this year, and is expected to expand to over 50% by 2020.

In addition to manufacturing in Malaysia, at the Samajaya Free Industrial Zone (SFIZ) in Kuching – established in 2016 – LONGi announced this year that it will set up shop in Gujarat, India, with 1 GW of cells and modules, respectively.

It was unclear at the time of publication whether the modules will be manufactured in China, Malaysia or India, and what duties they will be subject to.

Construction on the module factory is underway, with production expected to commence by the end of August 2019. Meanwhile, the cell factory is set to start production in January 2020 – a year later than originally planned, due to the increased capacity.

Correction: This article was modified on July 19 to remove a reference to where the modules will be made.