Solar earnings recap: Tigo Energy, Nextracker and FTC Solar

pv magazine USA’s recap of notable upstream solar, integrated solar, hardware, finance and rooftop installers that reported quarterly or fiscal year earnings over the last week.

May 12, 2023 Michael Schoeck

Image: iStock/Hannon Armstrong

pv magazine USA recaps the top earnings reports and conference calls for public companies that supply solar modules, silicon wafer materials, inverters, hardware and energy storage systems to the North American renewable energy market, as well as integrated residential solar installation companies and rooftop solar finance providers. This report tracks quarterly and annual volumes of orders, wafer material shipments and customer allocations.

On Friday, U.S. solar stocks traded up between 12% and 25% following the release of guidance from the U.S. Treasury on domestic content as it relates to the sourcing of American-made solar modules, hardware components under the federal Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. Nextracker, an integrated tracking hardware and software supplier, was up 12.7%, with its stock trading at $40.03 per share, its highest trading performance since becoming a public company on February 8, 2023.

Tigo Energy

Tigo Energy, a distributor of inverters, optimizers and energy storage systems, reported $50.1 million in Q1 2023 revenue, up 406% from $9.9 million generated in Q1 2022, while the company also had its first successful profitable quarter, with $6.9 million net income.

“Looking ahead, our focus remains on providing an exceptional customer experience, including through our technology’s open architecture, easy installation, and powerful software,” said Zvi Alon, chief executive officer of Tigo Energy “We anticipate that we will close our previously announced merger transaction with Roth CH IV later this month and believe that this transformation will propel us into a successful second half of the year.”

The company provided Q2 2023 guidance with revenue expected of $70 million to $74 million.

In December 2022, Tigo announced a merger with special purpose acquisition company Roth CH IV, a SPAC funded by Roth Capital Partners and Craig-Hallum Capital Group, with $117 million of gross proceeds. Upon completion later this month, Tigo Energy will trade on the Nasdaq exchange under ticker ‘TYGO.’

Nextracker

Nextracker, a Fremont, Calif.-based solar tracking hardware and software solutions provider, reported $518.4 million in its fiscal Q4 2023 revenue and net income of $27.5 million for the quarter, its first quarter as a public company.

The company also reported full year revenue of $1.9 billion and net income of $121.3 million for FY 2023. Over the last year the hardware company saw a 90% increase to its backlog, growing to $2.6 billion, while the company executed multiple project portfolio contracts with owners and developers.

In 2023, Nextracker shipped 17 GW of hardware systems.

During its Q1 2023 earnings call, management said for customers that require domestic content, the company can accept orders for 70% to 80% of domestic content this year and in 2024 anticipated accepting orders for up to 90% domestic content.

“Our ability to grow revenue by 30% and earnings by over 120% for fiscal 2023, while posting our fifth consecutive year of profitability, reflects our leadership position in solar markets around the world, a global supply chain footprint supporting those operations, as well as solid execution across the business,” said Dan Shugar, chief executive officer of Nextracker.

The company provided fiscal year 2024 guidance with revenue expected of $2.1 billion to $2.3 billion, and net income in the range of $175 million to $205 million.

FTC Solar

FTC Solar, an Austin, Texas-based solar tracking hardware provider, reported $40.9 million in Q1 2023 revenue, a slight beat over the market consensus of $39 million, though down 17.5% year-over-year from $49.6 million of Q1 2022 revenue.

In Q1 2023, the company attributed strong bookings of $235 million to the United States’ continued enforcement of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA), which has banned since December 2021 the imports of various solar components from global suppliers from the Uyghur region of China that had seen forced labor violations.

“Results for Q1 came in at the high-end of our target ranges on all metrics,” said Sean Hunkler, president and chief executive officer of FTC Solar. “Our strategy is working, the multiple initiatives we’ve executed on over the past year are improving our operating performance. For example, our improved cost structure has enabled us to post our first positive gross margin since our IPO, one that is 14-points higher today than it was in the fourth quarter of 2021 when we had two and a half times the revenue, and one that is 57 points higher than just two quarters ago.”

The company provided Q2 2023 guidance of $42.5 million to $52.5 million revenue and continues to forecast egative earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of negative $3.5 million to $7 million as the company sees continual growth ahead since becoming a public company in April 2021.

Upcoming earnings:

FREYR Battery reports Q1 2023 earnings on May 15, with a conference call scheduled for 8:30 a.m. ET;
Canadian Solar reports Q1 2023 earnings on May 18, with a conference call scheduled for 8:30 a.m. ET; access to the call is available by calling 877-704-4453.

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