SunPower Hits Significant Loss In Advance Of Yieldco Plans
The second largest US solar manufacturer, SunPower, published its Q1’2015 earnings on April 30, and as expected, revenue was significantly down in preparation of the company’s joint yieldco partnership with First Solar, which also suffered significant losses.
Revenue for the first quarter came in at only $440.9 million, a 36% decrease on $692.4 million in the first quarter of 2014, and a massive 62% decrease on 2014’s fourth quarter earnings of $1,164.2 million.
Unsurprisingly, following the announcement, SunPower’s shares fell 3.25%.
It’s not all bad news, however, according to SunPower president and CEO, Tom Werner.
“Our solid first quarter results reflect the advantages of our global, diversified downstream strategy as demand for our high efficiency systems in both our power plant and distributed generation segments remains strong. Operationally, we achieved record quarterly output at our cell manufacturing facilities in the first quarter and continued to execute against our long-term cost reduction roadmap. We are pleased with our progress implementing our next generation cell technology in our new Fab 4 facility.”
SunPower has a number of projects currently under construction, several of which are destined for their planned yieldco, 8point3 Energy Partners, a joint project with competitor, First Solar.
However, recent news also saw SunPower begin to make waves in China, thanks in part to a new partnership with consumer electronics giant, Apple. Earlier this week SunPower and Apple announced plans to develop two solar power projects in China, totaling 40 MW. Subsequently, CEO Werner proclaimed China to be SunPower’s “fastest-growing region in the next five years.”
Given the looking yieldco, which is currently in registration, SunPower has also shied away from providing fiscal year 2015 guidance “until the company can finalise the estimates regarding the impact of the proposed yieldco vehicle on the company’s expected financial performance.”
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