French manufacturers in difficulty facing Chinese competition

The Systovi company, one of the last two manufacturers which assemble panels in France, near Nantes, is looking for a buyer.

The boom of photovoltaic does not benefit everyone. Although the French are installing more and more solar panels on the roofs of their homes to produce electricity, very few are manufactured in France.

Faced with Chinese competition, one of the last two manufacturers which assemble panels in France is looking for a buyer as quickly as possible. This company is Systovi, based in Carquefou, near Nantes: 87 employees, and 15 years of existence.

A production line stopped

In the Loire-Atlantique factory, only one in two production lines is operating. However, the machines still smell new. “We finished installing this production line completely last October,” explains Paul Toulouse, general manager of Systovi for two and a half years.

“Today, we produce between 300 and 400 panels per day. Unfortunately, part of this production is stored, because the order book is not enough to sell all this production.”

Paul Toulouse, general manager of Systovi

at franceinfo

Panels twice as expensive in China

A collapse in orders which would have started last summer, because of Chinese competition, explains Paul Toulouse. No longer having access to the American market, Chinese manufacturers are selling off their solar panels in Europe and “halved the price of their panel”explains Paul Toulouse, who illustrates his point.

“Today, if you are an individual, and you want to equip your home with photovoltaic panels (editor’s note: for a global installation, in addition to the panel itself), it will cost you roughly 1,000 euros more, on a bill estimated at 8,000 euros, to install French panels compared to Chinese panels. Everything that makes the brand quality is no longer enough to convince customers to pay this price difference.”

To limit losses, Systovi reduced the assembly rate from January. From now on, Systovi’s two production lines operate alternately, with two teams taking turns: one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Management thus ended temporary contracts. An insufficient strategy: management is therefore looking for a buyer by mid-April. The announcement upsets employees like Yannick Fasseel, 46 years old. This line driver joined the team 11 months ago.

“I made this choice to make solar panels by telling myself that it is a format for the future. The choice to create in France something which will allow us to escape global warming, so that the solar panel French has a name and an existence. And to see this project broken, it’s disappointing, there is no other word. It’s total disappointment.”

“We have been promised for years that we will be protected”

A disillusionment also for Amélie Sicard, 41 years old. Systovi’s purchasing manager for four and a half years recalls the government’s speeches on reindustrialization and French sovereignty: “That For years we have been promised that we will be protected, if Europe and France could finally put up barriers or in any case, equality in relation to this competition which is unfair, that could help us.

There are currently discussions across Europe to change regulations and promote French and European manufacturers. But these new measures will come “too late” for the current management of Systovi. According to Paul Toulouse, the significant effects will not be felt for two years.

Director-General calls on Europe and France to support local businesses and “making access to the European market a little less easy for imported panels”. So that France remains “master of its energy transition”, he pleads for the development of a stronger sector, both for assembly and for components. Because if Systovi assembles its panels in Carquefou, the group imports photovoltaic cells from China, like the vast majority of its competitors.