The Bosch Group plans to set-up a RM2.2 billion photovoltaics manufacturing plant in the Batu Kawan, Penang, to mainly serve Asia's growing solar energy market.
Robert Bosch Sdn Bhd Managing Director Martin Hayes said: "The Asian market is set to see an average annual growth of 30 per cent in the coming years.
"Components for manufacturing sites in other countries will also be produced at the new Malaysian site".
Hayes also said Bosch had chosen Malaysia as the country offered qualified workforce in the fields of electronics and semiconductors as well as good local infrastructure.
"We have good experience in Malaysia since 1923. We are quite familiar with the favourable conditions offered in Penang," Hayes told reporters after a media briefing on Bosch's financial performance for 2010 today.
Chairman of the Bosch Solar Energy AG Holger Von Hebel said construction of the new site was set to begin before the end of this year and the total plant would be fully completed by 2014.
The first production is expected to start by end 2013.
"The planned facility will cover the entire value-added chain, from silicon crystals known as ingots and solar cells to the modules which can be installed on roofs or in solar power plants," said Von Hebel.
He said by then, some 2,000 associates would be working at the new site in Penang, producing solar power plants with a total peak output of 640 megawatts each year.
The module production lines will reach an annual peak capacity of 150 megawatts.
He added that the solar energy business contributed about 900 million Euros to the group's total sales of 47 billion Euros in 2010.
In 2011, the business aims to generate one billion Euros in sales for the first time. -- Bernama
Read more: Bosch plans RM2.2b photovoltaics plant http://www.btimes.com.my/Current_News/BTIMES/articles/20110622213358/Article/index_html#ixzz1Q0vRi97U
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