My Vote Goes To String PV Inverters Against Central Inverters: Kevin George, Regional Sales Head, GoodWe

My Vote Goes To Utility Inverters Against Central Inverters: Kevin George, Regional Sales Head, GoodWe

GoodWe is a leading global manufacturer and innovator of residential and commercial smart solar inverters, energy storage solutions and PV building materials. The brand stood among the top three solar PV inverters in Europe in 2022. Kevin George, Regional Sales Head, GoodWe (solar inverters in residential, C&I and utility sector) sheds light on the offerings from GoodWe and draws comparisons between the string and central inverters in a telling interview. 

Please tell us about your recently launched 350-kilowatt string inverter.

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The 350-kilowatt inverter was launched at SNEC in China, following which, we saw immense success in the country. We are now launching it in India this year. The background of the 350 kw inverter is that it comes from our successful 250-kilowatt model. The 250kw model was launched in 2020 and after that, we saw tremendous success in sales for the product in the Indian market as well as globally. The response from customers in terms of the services and generations has been met with success.

Could you tell us the difference between string PV inverters and central inverters? Where is your tilt?

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In string PV inverters, even if one inverter faces downtime, it doesn’t affect the other strings. Additionally, there is no loss of generation as compared to the central inverter. However, in central inverters, the moment the inverter is in downtime, half the plant that is connected to the inverter shuts down. Further, string inverters win on the maintenance part as these inverters can be easily replaced if the need arises. It’s a plug-and-play model. That is not the case with central inverters. Central inverters cannot be easily removed as uninstalling and reinstalling takes a lot of time. So, from the perspective of the EPC players and the developers, a great deal of generational loss can be saved with the help of the string PV inverters.

In terms of cost, string PV inverters are costlier than central inverter when we look at per megawatt scale. But in terms of generation, the string PV inverters are getting better generation than the central inverter. Yet whatever higher prices the customers are paying, they automatically get compensated with higher generation. My vote goes to utility inverters against central inverters.

Between C&I, utility and residential, which one claims the largest part of your sales?

The largest claim is from residential, followed by C&I and finally, utility. The share of utility has been less because we launched the first utility inverter in 2020. But from 2002 onwards, we have been able to close nearly 200-250 megawatts of projects to date.

 What are the reasons behind the residential sector picking up?

The first major factor is the initiatives, policies and subsidies provided by the government. Another reason is that initially, the customers were more price-centric but nowadays, we see that the customer is focused on the quality, the performance and the warranty that they are getting along with the inverter when they purchase it. We not only guarantee the performance of the inverter, but we have the biggest service team in India. We provide services pan-India.

How crucial is the O&M market for solar inverters? 

In solar inverters, the O&M market is very crucial because once you commission the project or the plant, it has to be maintained well. If maintenance is not done well, there is generational loss. The plants may shut down, which leads to further losses. So, O&M plays a very crucial part and to support our customers, EPC players and clients, we have a very robust team in the service sector and the amount of manpower that we have deployed throughout India, the warehouses that we have in Mumbai and the service centres that we have in Bengaluru and Gurugram, all these have helped us to support our customers on the O&M front.

Tell us about your currently installed capacities and what are the capacities that you are looking at in the next two to three years.

Currently, we have around 3 plus GW of installed capacities in India and in the coming years, we are looking at an almost 100% increase on this.