General Electric (GE) and First Solar have decided to join their competing thin-film solar panel technologies in an effort to improve efficiency and decrease costs.
First Solar is the world's largest producer of thin-film panels and among the world's largest solar farm developers. GE's thin-film technology has performed well in lab tests, but is not manufactured at large scale.
As announced by the companies on 6th August, they will enter into agreements for the technology tie-up and stake purchase.
As per the agreement contract:
- First Solar will acquire GE's technology for making thin film panels.
- In return, GE will receive 1.75 million shares of First Solar stock. That represents $82 million, and 2 percent of First Solar's outstanding shares.
- First Solar will attempt to incorporate GE's technology into its extensive and well-developed manufacturing process.
- GE will purchase and brand First Solar panels for its own installations.
According to sources, the reason behind this move of GE is the glut of solar panels on the market and falling prices.
Due to this, GE's Denver factor which was having annual capacity of 400 MWs will be shut down along with a research center with around 400 people loosing their jobs.
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