Hard Choices: Evergreen Solar's China Move

[OhioChick]

CEO Michael El-Hillow on why he closed his U.S. plant, fired 800 workers, and is moving his company to China

We make silicon wafers that go into solar panels. In 2008 we decided to build a plant in Massachusetts to be near our research and development facility. There was a groundswell of optimism that the U.S. was going to take the lead in the drive for alternative energy.

There were challenges from the start. Lehman Brothers was our banker and had almost a third of our outstanding shares as part of a financing transaction. That disappeared in Lehman's bankruptcy and cost us about $300 million. Then we went to the federal government to get help from the TARP funds, but they said no because we weren't a financial institution.

In December 2008 we were approached by a Chinese company, Jiawei, which was impressed with our wafer technology. The Chinese government agreed to support a loan that would cover two-thirds of our expansion in China. The subsidies we received from the government here covered less than 5 percent of the cost of our U.S. plant. We received $20 million and some future tax credits, but you can't pay taxes if you don't make money.

More: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_06/b4214080431984.htm

[shireen]

1. that's sad ....

i wonder how many other businesses like them had to make such a tough choice to survive. Where were the greedy bankers who made monstrous profits after the bailouts.

All this lack of action by the government and business community is just making China more powerful. :(

[Hydra]

2. The worst thing is that it's deliberate inaction

The green jobs revolution COULD have happened here.

Instead it will happen someplace else.

[roody]

3. We are one people on one planet.

It is a good time to learn Chinese, although I do not plan to.