Moser Baer to set up solar cell facility in Tamilnadu
Chennai, Sep 18 2007
Source: LiveMint.com/Wall Street Journal
Moser Baer Ltd, a leading manufacturer of compact discs, will set up a Rs2,000 crore photo-voltaic manufacturing facility in Tamil Nadu to tap solar energy as India battles an energy shortage. The company expects to earn $1 billion (Rs 4,050 crore) after five years through this facility, which will make cells that help convert solar energy into electricity, and will be the first for the New Delhi-based firm. The investment will be made through its unit Moser Baer Photo Voltaic Ltd and funded through internal accruals.
“There is a tremendous disconnect between the power required and power generated,” said Deepak Puri, managing director of Moser Baer India, on the sidelines of Connect 2007, a two-day event jointly organized by the Tamil Nadu government and the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), an industry lobby.
The investment will be eligible for tax incentives under those schemes of the Union government that seek to attract investment in the non-conventional energy sector. The plant will be located at Oragadam in Sriperumbudur, around 40km from Chennai, at a special economic zone (SEZ)—units located at such zones are eligible for tax and other incentives. Sriperumbudur has emerged as a hub for electronics manufacturing in the past two years. International hardware manufacturers such as Nokia, Foxconn, Flextronics
and Motorola have already established facilities there.
Shaktikanta Das, industries secretary, government of Tamil Nadu, said the project is the first of its kind in India. Moser Baer said the facility would generate employment for 4,000 people. “Tamil Nadu, with a large pool of talented and educated workforce, is well positioned to capture investments in the ICT (information, communications and technology) sector,” Puri said.
Ancillary units manufacturing conductors, inverters and switchgears are also expected to set up their facilities near Moser Baer’s unit, for which it has asked 250 acres from the state government. These units are expected to generate revenue between Rs8,000 crore and Rs10,000 crore at the end of five years, Puri said. The plant will start rolling out products 15-18 months after the land acquisition process. Shares of the company closed at Rs300.25 on the Bombay Stock Exchange, down 0.65% from the previous closing price of Rs302.