The chief executive officer of Tata BP Solar Ltd resigned, exiting India’s third largest panel maker as the industry struggles to cope with oversupply from Chinese competitors that’s crushed prices, says a Bloomberg report.
K Subramanya said in an email that he is resigning as the head of the solar company and that he hasn’t decided yet what he will do next. He didn’t provide a reason for his resignation.
Indian panel makers such as Tata BP, Indosolar Ltd (ISLR) and Moser Baer India Ltd (MBI) are struggling along with counterparts in the US and Europe after lower cost Chinese manufacturers boosted supply. Germany and Italy, the two biggest markets for the technology, have scaled back subsidies for renewable energy.
Indian manufacturers received almost no orders for the more than 700 megawatts of sun-powered capacity under construction in the nation last year and have idled their factories, Subramanya said in an interview in December.
Tata Power Co (TPWR), the utility arm of the industrial group that owns Jaguar Land Rover, agreed to buy out BP Plc (BP/)’s stake in the Indian joint venture in December after the British oil company said it was winding down its solar business worldwide.
Prices of silicon based panels plunged 47 per cent in the past year, helping to tip at least seven US and German manufacturers into bankruptcy.
