A new report from IMS Research has revealed that the global solar inverter market more than doubled to reach $2.4 billion in 2008. Analysis has also revealed that a number of companies traditionally associated with industries such as UPS, power supplies and motor drives have found particular success in transferring their expertise to the photovoltaic (PV) inverter market. The global supplier base for PV inverters is likely to change significantly over the next few years according to IMS Research with many new companies expected to enter this quickly growing market.

Existing suppliers of UPS, power supplies and drives, such as Delta Electronics, Siemens, Riello UPS, and Electtronica Santerno have been attracted by the high growth and gross margins of the PV inverter industry and have been able to quickly serve the growing demand to gain significant share of their booming local markets as well as establish themselves as significant global suppliers.

Research analyst and co-author of IMS Research’s ‘World Market for PV Inverters’ study, Sam Wilkinson commented, “The similarities between these technologies and solar inverters has allowed suppliers to transfer their power design expertise, along with their established sales channels and relatively large production capabilities to quickly enter the PV inverter market with good success.” Wilkinson added “growth opportunities exist in almost every segment of the PV inverter market, however many suppliers have been targeting the 100kW+ three-phase market which is anticipated to grow by 25% over the next five years.”

Although the global PV inverter market is set to fall in 2009, this is mainly due to very specific factors such as legislative changes in Spain and it has been much more resilient to the economic downturn which has affected almost every other markets. PV inverter revenues are projected to grow at a double-digit rate over the next five years however, exceeding $4 billion by 2013.