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Rest in Peace: The List of Deceased Solar Companies ... The sad, inevitable results of the VC bubble and solar shakeout

Burgess COMMENTARY
My comment on this article:

As I read this, I kept thinking about economic history ... railroads, car companies, steel, aircraft, computers, dot com, etc. Essentially everything goes through a cycle of early innovation, consolidation and maturation and eventually a more or less stable state usually a state where there is dangerous concentration of economic power. Solar is unlikely to be any different.

Rest in Peace: The List of Deceased Solar Companies ... The sad, inevitable results of the VC bubble and solar shakeout

We listed the more than 200 VC-funded solar startups back in 2008.

We knew that we'd be writing about most of them on their way up -- as well as on their way down.

Add one more solar company to the list of insolvent solar firms. It's one you may not have heard of: Concentrator Optics. The firm had received investment from Capricorn Venture Partners to build Fresnel lenses for the CPV market.

Imagine approaching a VC firm with that pitch today.

GTM Research forecasts 21 gigawatts of PV module manufacturing capacity coming offline by 2015 as the global market reconciles a dire supply-demand imbalance. (See PV Technology, Production and Cost Outlook: 2012-2016.)

Capacity coming offline means less-efficient companies closing down. Of course there's another long list of relatively unknown Chinese companies closing down as well. Here's an incomplete list of the solar firms that have left the building -- either by closure, bankruptcy, or fire-sale acquisition:

2009 to 2010

Bankrupt, closed, acquired

• Advent Solar (emitter wrap-through Si) acquired by Applied Materials
• Applied Solar (solar roofing) acquired by Quercus Trust
• OptiSolar (a-Si on a grand scale) closed
• Ready Solar (PV installation) acquired by SunEdison
• Solasta (nano-coaxial solar) closed
• SV Solar (low-concentration PV) closed
• Senergen (depositing silane onto free-form metallurgical-grade Si substrates) closed
• Signet Solar (a-Si) bankrupt
• Sunfilm (a-Si) bankrupt
• Wakonda (GaAs) closed

Bankrupt, closed

• EPV Solar (a-Si) bankrupt
• Evergreen (drawn Si) bankrupt
• Solyndra (CIGS) bankrupt
• SpectraWatt (c-Si) bankrupt
• Stirling Energy Systems (dish engine) bankrupt

• Ascent Solar (CIGS) acquired by TFG Radiant
• Calyxo (CdTe) acquired by Solar Fields from Q.cells
• HelioVolt (CIGS) acquired by Korea's SK Innovation
• National Semiconductor Solar Magic (panel optimizers) exited systems business
• NetCrystal (silicon on flexible substrate) acquired by Solar Semiconductor
• Soliant (CPV) acquired by Emcore

Bankrupt, closed

• Abound Solar (CdTe) bankrupt
• AQT (CIGS) closed
• Ampulse (thin silicon) closed
• Arise Technology (PV modules) bankrupt
• Azuray (microinverters) closed
• BP (c-Si panels) exits solar business
• Centrotherm (PV manufacturing equipment) bankrupt
• CSG (c-Si on glass) closed by Suntech
• Day4 Energy (cell interconnects) delisted from TSX exchange
• ECD (a-Si) bankrupt
• Energy Innovations (CPV) bankrupt
• Flexcell (a-Si roll-roll BIPV) closed
• GlobalWatt (solar) closed
• GreenVolts (CPV) closed
• Global Solar Energy (CIGS) closed
• G24i (DSCs) bankrupt in 2012, re-emerged as G24i Power with new investors
• Hoku (polysilicon) shut down its Idaho polysilicon production facility
• Isofoton (c-Si) bankrupt
• Inventux (a-Si) bankrupt
• Konarka (OSCs) bankrupt
• Odersun (CIGS) bankrupt
• Pramac (a-Si panels built with equipment from Oerlikon) insolvent
• Pairan (Germany inverters) insolvent
• Ralos (developer) bankrupt
• REC Wafer (c-Si) bankrupt
• Satcon (BoS) bankrupt
• Schott (c-Si) exits c-Si business
• Schuco (a-Si) shutting down its a-Si business
• Sencera (a-Si) closed
• Siliken (c-Si modules) closed
• Skyline Solar (LCPV) closed
• Siemens (CSP, inverters, BOS) divestment from solar
• Solar Millennium (developer) insolvent
• Solarhybrid (developer) insolvent
• Solarwatt (c-Si modules) bankrupt
• Sovello (Q.cells, Evergreen, REC JV) bankrupt
• SolarDay (c-Si modules) insolvent
• Solar Power Industries (PV modules) bankrupt
• Soltecture (CIGS BIPV) bankrupt
• Sun Concept (developer) bankrupt

• Oelmaier (Germany inverters) insolvent, bought by agricultural supplier Lehner Agrar
• Q.Cells (c-Si) insolvent, acquired by South Korea's Hanwha
• Sharp (a-Si) backing away from a-Si, retiring 160 of its 320 megawatts in Japan
• Solibro (CIGS) Q-Cells unit acquired by China's Hanergy
• Solon (c-Si) acquired by UAE's Microsol
• Scheuten Solar (BIPV) bankrupt, then acquired by Aikosolar
• SolFocus (CPV) layoffs, restructuring for sale
• Sunways (c-Si, inverters) bought by LDK, restructuring to focus on BIPV and storage

Bankrupt, closed

• Bosch (c-Si PV module) exits module business
• Concentrator Optics (CPV) bankrupt
• Suntech (c-Si) bankrupt

• Diehl (Germany inverters) inverter division sold to PE firm mutares AG
• ISET (CIGS) moving into 'microsolar'
• MiaSolé (CIGS) acquired by China's Hanergy
• Nanosolar (CIGS) restructuring for sale
• NuvoSun (CIGS) acquired by Dow
• Twin Creeks (kerfless Si) acquired by GT Advanced Technology
• Wuerth Solar (installer) business turned over to BayWa