SolarCity Corporation, the dominant U.S. installer of residential solar panels led by entrepreneur Elon Musk, announced Tuesday that it intends to acquire solar panel maker Silevo to expand its capacity.
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“If we didn’t do this, we thought there was a risk of not having enough solar panels to expand our business long-term,” chairman Elon Musk, also CEO of Tesla Motors, said Tuesday in a conference call. He said a lot of basic panels are being made but not enough advanced ones. He said increased production of the latter will boost the ability of solar to compete with other energy sources without government subsidies.
“We’ll be the most vertically integrated solar company in the world,” said SolarCity co-founder Peter Rive, its chief technology officer, noting the company aims to build a manufacturing facility in Upstate New York that will create thousands of jobs. Rive and his brother Lyndon, the company’s CEO, are Musk’s cousins.
The co-founders said they expect to open other factories as well and produce efficient but attractive panels that will make a home’s roof look better — not worse.