Ten at SolarWorld Celebrate 30 Years of Solar-Pioneer Leadership

CAMARILLO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--A contingent of SolarWorld employees here is celebrating at least 30 years of building the world’s best-performing solar modules at a factory that has continuously blazed a trail for the U.S. photovoltaic manufacturing industry.   

Raju Yenamandra went to work at the plant in June 1980, for instance, after earning a master’s degree in engineering with a concentration on solar at Florida Institute of Technology in the late 1970s, just as industry-scale manufacturing began to gain traction. He is among the 10 most veteran employees, two of whom started in 1979. Their specializations, centered on Camarillo’s module assembly operations, includes lamination, quality control, logistics, document control and facilities.

Now vice president of U.S. sales, Mr. Yenamandra recently was quoted on Greenbuildingadvisor.com. Writer Martin Holladay reported dismantling a module produced at the plant and installed on his roof in 1980, then testing the module’s performance. Concluding the module still generates electricity at original specifications, he wrote in the article, “It certainly looks as if it’s ready to perform for another decade.”

The most enduring U.S. solar production facility, the Camarillo plant was first to produce 1 megawatt of solar technology in a year, secure UL certification for a panel and offer a 25-year performance warranty. This year, it was first to offer a linear warranty. As the company aggressively expands this year, the sales and marketing unit based in Camarillo is doubling in size to deploy much higher volumes.

Mr. Yenamandra is directing implementation of the redoubled sales strategy. “SolarWorld’s dogged and bold advance in technological leadership and economies of scale in production on U.S. soil has continued to realize decades of vision, research and pioneering by my many colleagues since the 1970s,” Mr. Yenamandra said. “The achievement is both professionally and personally awesome to behold.”

The Camarillo site grew out of a startup launched in 1975. It sold to ARCO Solar, ARCO to Siemens Solar, and Siemens to Shell Solar. SolarWorld purchased Shell’s solar factories in 2006 and opened an even bigger plant in Hillsboro, Ore., in 2008. Many key U.S. company personnel, however, remain the same.