In a report, the market research company additionally states that despite factory-gate prices declining around 11 percent in 2010, the revenue generated by PV inverters almost doubled. It exceeded US$5 billion for the first time. In the longer term, positive growth is predicted to continue, despite on-going price reductions and architecture changes, and the market will double in size again in the next five years.
A major imbalance occurred in 2010 when a bottleneck in component supply in early 2010, together with a booming German market led to a severe shortage of inverters. This was further aggravated by customers who double-ordered in fear. Nevertheless, not all inverter suppliers were negatively affected. Some like Power One captured a major share of the market with their promt supplies.
IMS Research confirms that shortage has now switched to major oversupply of inverters with high levels of inventory recorded at the end of last year, which is still being reflected this year.
PV Research Director, Ash Sharma commented: "Despite the shortage of inverters at the beginning of 2010, IMS Research estimates that more than two GW of inverters were produced that were not needed. This has led to high inventory levels, both at suppliers warehouses, and throughout the supply chain. This came as a direct result of double-orders being fulfilled and has also led to cancellations and push-backs of orders."
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