The chief executive officer of Tata BP Solar resigned, exiting India’s third-largest panel maker as the industry struggles to cope with oversupply from Chinese competitors that has crushed prices.
K. Subramanya said in an e-mail that tomorrow will be his last day at the head of the solar company and that he has not decided yet what he will do next. He did not provide a reason for his resignation.
Indian panel makers such as Tata BP, Indosolar and Moser Baer India are struggling along with counterparts in the US and Europe after lower-cost Chinese manufacturers boosted supply. Germany and Italy, the two biggest markets for the technology, have scaled back subsidies for renewable energy.
Indian manufacturers received almost no orders for the more than 700 megawatts of sun-powered capacity under construction in the nation last year and have idled their factories, Subramanya said in an interview in December.
Tata Power, the utility arm of the industrial group that owns Jaguar Land Rover, agreed to buy out BP’s stake in the Indian joint venture in December after the British oil company said it was winding down its solar business worldwide.
Prices of silicon-based panels plunged 47 percent in the past year, helping to tip at least seven US and German manufacturers into bankruptcy.
