Solar Industry on a Roller Coaster Polysilicon spot prices have dipped below $40 per kg. Yesterday, summarizing insights gained from last week’s Solar Power International (SPI) conference, Mercom Capital Group forecast a “Poly Price Collapse”. Crisis? Or not? While poly production may not yet be in crisis, red ink in downstream PV module production has become a critical industry issue. Last week, Mehdi Hosseini of Susquehanna...

Game-changing Pillars. The need to stay market focused in technology development and get products quickly into customer hands translates to the Pillar of Process. Market requirements, corporate direction and technology options can all change quickly and must be tightly integrated with the development Process. For a new venture, the ability to predict market conditions is limited at best. Thus, rapid new product and process development...

Cleantech is not a singular industry. There are many industries that have Cleantech opportunities. The maturity of the specific Cleantech target industry, its Phase, can have a powerful influence on Cleantech business success.        While Phase issues do exist in other industries, Phase challenges in Cleantech targets are considerably more pronounced. Target industry Phase should be considered in market selection, business...

Sienna Cathedral Leverages Four Pillar Framework The Cleantech Pillars framework is a new assessment tool for Cleantech ventures.  The four Pillars represent the generic contextual hurdles within Cleantech. These are the factors that differentiate Cleantech opportunities from more conventional technology ventures. The four Cleantech Pillars are Plant, Process, Phase and Policy. Plant and Process cycle are internally oriented business...

Cleantech is widely anticipated to be the next big wealth creation opportunity.      Oddly, however, success in Cleantech business investments has been somewhat elusive especially in the venture capital (VC) community. This paradox is true even though Cleantech has had the strong support of a mature VC industry along with motivated equity markets – albeit impacted by the Financial Crisis and global recession.    Cleantech Pillars...