Pv Technologies Inc.: Where They Asleep at the Switch?

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- What will PVTs product team want to say about the new products, particularly the accelerated introduction of the new central inverter and the marketing initiative? R&D? The finance people? The engineers? The public relations people? Sales? Customer service?

The engineers: They believed that with industry leading 98.5% efficiency and service life comparable to 1.0 MW inverter, the new 1.25 MW inverter would be the most efficient and reliable product in the market. They also emphasized that cost-saving and new state of the art manufacturing techniques would allow PVT to price the new inverter very close to existing 1.0 MW inverter which otherwise would not have been achievable.

Strategic planning: They felt this was a suitable option to move ahead of competition without compromising current market strategy and pricing approach. They could simply modify test routine and move testing up in the queue to meet Solenergy’s product availability requirement.

R&D team: Though R&D team appreciated the fact this could lead to convenience to Solenergy to use PVT’s superior and latest market product, they expressed concern about compressed time frame which could lead to malfunctioned product being introduced in the market and damaging overall reputation.

Finance and product development teams: These teams expressed the same concern as R&D in regards to potential malfunctions and expressed the feeling that it would not serve Solenergy’s requirement. They also brought up that technology has reached where lower cost options were feasible by coupling two smaller size inverters rather than using one single large inverter.

Sales force and customer service: While acknowledging the concern that large capacity inverter would lead to longer downtime for maintenance, they believed that it could be effectively sold to large users at reasonable net price as utility project were becoming larger.

Public relations: They echoed what sales force expressed about having large-scale technology which is what marker needed. This could strengthen PVT’s position in the market for being first to innovate and introduce new product which could create positive impact on revenues for considerable time frame.

- How should PVT promote itself in the first quarter 2012 and position the launch of the new 1. 25 MW central inverter that’s been re-schedule for introduction in January?

PVT should emphasize on the fact that the inverter is more powerful at 1.25 MW capacity but still comparable to smaller 1.0 MW model in price. It should also promote higher reliability and efficiency as one of the primary key features. PVT also should establish better relationship with its key customer and communicate in effective way to make them aware of the new product and it’s potential. They should also mention about how hey they are still the leaders of this industry by being the first company to launch 1.25 MW inverter.

- What conclusions can be drawn about the evolution and impending changes in technology, pricing, and buying criteria in this business?

With innovation in manufacturing techniques and availability of raw materials at cheaper prices all around the world, industries are evolving in to becoming lean manufacturing machines. Also, cutting down on capital expense has become a norm in industries to win projects without consideration of it resulting in higher expenditures down the line. Chinese companies, for example in this case, are already offering products that, although inferior in quality and reliability, have a much inferior target price. It is reasonable to think that with time, the gap in the quality level will reduce, and as it happens the price will pose a bigger and bigger problem to the other players. These have challenged companies to constantly be on their toes to develop both economical and effective solution to survive. The main buying criteria have been cost driven which is generating demand for higher quality goods at reasonable pricing. Overall, for any business to sustain or thrive in the industry requires it not only to be superior in the quality of its products, but also needs to be economical to be preferred by buyers to win jobs and to keep business growing.