Sites decision: Meyer Burger wants to establish its own production of solar cells and solar modules in Saxony-Anhalt and Saxony

• Meyer Burger selects traditional solar sites in Bitterfeld-Wolfen (Saxony-Anhalt) and Freiberg (Saxony) for the establishment of production facilities
• Use of existing infrastructure is aimed at saving resources - skilled workers and competencies available in the regions
• Ramp-up plans: production start in the first half of 2021 with 400 MW solar cells and 400 MW solar modules, expansion to 5 GW planned
• Use of locations requires successful implementation of capital increase

Meyer Burger Tech­nol­ogy Ltd (SIX Swiss Ex­change: MBTN) has cho­sen lo­ca­tions in the “Solar Val­ley” in Bit­ter­feld-Wolfen (Sax­ony-An­halt) and in Freiberg (Sax­ony) to start its own solar cell and mod­ule pro­duc­tion. “We are look­ing for­ward to re­vi­tal­is­ing two of the most tra­di­tional solar lo­ca­tions in Eu­rope and cre­at­ing new jobs," said Gunter Er­furt, CEO of Meyer Burger. “The fact that we are able to use ex­ist­ing in­fra­struc­tures and the high level of ex­per­tise in the re­gions is a con­scious strate­gic de­ci­sion that will en­able us to achieve short ramp-up times and high prod­uct qual­ity”.

A team of in­ter­nal and ex­ter­nal pro­duc­tion spe­cial­ists eval­u­ated the con­di­tions at the sites and rated them as very favourable. In Bit­ter­feld-Wolfen, Meyer Burger rents build­ings of the for­mer solar cell man­u­fac­turer Sovello on a long-term and cost-ef­fec­tive basis. Ini­tially, the build­ings will cover an area of 27,000 square me­tres; ad­di­tional space can be rented for ex­ten­sions if re­quired. Meyer Burger will use its lat­est pro­duc­tion equip­ment there to man­u­fac­ture highly ef­fi­cient solar cells using the pro­pri­etary het­ero­junc­tion tech­nol­ogy.

The high-ef­fi­ciency cells are fur­ther processed into SmartWire mod­ules in Freiberg, al­most 150 kilo­me­tres away. “With Meyer Burger, there is once again a sup­plier of tech­no­log­i­cally lead­ing solar cells Made in Eu­rope,” said Gunter Er­furt. “Al­most all solar mod­ules man­u­fac­tured in Eu­rope today con­tain cells that come from Asia.”

Meyer Burger will man­u­fac­ture the patent-pro­tected SmartWire mod­ules in a pro­duc­tion fa­cil­ity of the for­mer So­lar­world Group. To date, it is the largest and most mod­ern plant of its kind in Eu­rope. With an area of around 19,000 square me­tres, it also of­fers op­ti­mal con­di­tions for the con­ver­sion and adap­ta­tion of the ex­ist­ing in­fra­struc­ture and the highly au­to­mated mod­ule pro­duc­tion lines. Today, the plant has an an­nual nom­i­nal ca­pac­ity of more than 600 MW, which can be in­creased to more than 800 MW with new tech­nolo­gies. In ad­di­tion, Meyer Burger is ac­quir­ing the mod­ern lo­gis­tics and dis­tri­b­u­tion cen­tre (14,000 square me­tres) at the for­mer So­lar­world site in Freiberg, which will pro­vide the in­fra­struc­ture for the es­tab­lish­ment of an ef­fi­cient dis­tri­b­u­tion struc­ture. The par­ties have agreed with the in­sol­vency ad­min­is­tra­tor, Christoph Nier­ing, not to dis­close the pur­chase price.

The ca­pac­i­ties for the start of pro­duc­tion in the first half of 2021 will be 400 MW per year in solar cell pro­duc­tion and 400 MW in mod­ule pro­duc­tion. Fur­ther ex­pan­sion is then planned up to 5 GW. Meyer Burger in­tends to pro­duce next-gen­er­a­tion solar mod­ules that have a higher out­put per area and a sig­nif­i­cantly higher en­ergy yield com­pared to the cur­rent stan­dard tech­nol­ogy.

Takeover of sites planned sub­ject to com­ple­tion of planned cap­i­tal in­crease

The de­vel­op­ment of the two lo­ca­tions by Meyer Burger re­quires the suc­cess­ful im­ple­men­ta­tion of the planned or­di­nary cap­i­tal in­crease an­nounced on 19 June 2020, with tar­geted gross pro­ceeds of CHF 165 mil­lion. For this, the com­pany re­quires the ap­proval of the share­hold­ers at the Ex­tra­or­di­nary Gen­eral Meet­ing on 10 July 2020. The trans­ac­tion is ex­pected to be com­pleted by the end of July. Fur­ther­more, the cred­i­tors' meet­ing of So­lar­world In­dus­tries GmbH still has to ap­prove the pur­chase agree­ment of the Freiberg sites.

Con­tacts:

Nicole Borel
Head of Cor­po­rate Com­mu­ni­ca­tions
Tel: +41 33 221 28 34
nicole.​borel@​meyerburger.​com

Dy­nam­ics Group AG
An­dreas Durisch, Se­nior Part­ner
Tel +41 43 268 27 47 | Mob +41 79 358 87 32
adu@​dyn​amic​sgro​up.​ch

About Meyer Burger Tech­nol­ogy Ltd

www.​meyerburger.​com

Meyer Burger is a lead­ing and glob­ally ac­tive tech­nol­ogy com­pany spe­cial­iz­ing in in­no­v­a­tive sys­tems and pro­duc­tion equip­ment for the pho­to­voltaic (solar) in­dus­try. As an in­ter­na­tion­ally renowned pre­mium brand, Meyer Burger of­fers its cus­tomers in the PV in­dus­try de­pend­able pre­ci­sion prod­ucts and in­no­v­a­tive so­lu­tions for the man­u­fac­ture of high-ef­fi­ciency solar cells and solar mod­ules.

The com­pre­hen­sive prod­uct range is com­ple­mented by a world­wide ser­vice net­work with spare and wear­ing parts, con­sum­ables, process know-how, main­te­nance and after-sales ser­vice, train­ing courses and ad­di­tional ser­vices. Meyer Burger is rep­re­sented in the re­spec­tive key mar­kets in Eu­rope and Asia and has sub­sidiaries and its own ser­vice cen­ters in China, Ger­many, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Switzer­land, Sin­ga­pore, Tai­wan and the USA. The reg­is­tered shares in Meyer Burger Tech­nol­ogy Ltd are listed at the SIX Swiss Ex­change (Ticker: MBTN).

Quelle: www.meyerburger.com/de