Hyderabad may house Moser Baer PV facility

May invest Rs 3000 crore to set up two units.

The Delhi-based Moser Baer Photo Voltaic (MBPV), the wholly-owned subsidiary of optical storage media manufacturer Moser Baer, is likely to set up a photovoltaic (PV) cell unit at the proposed Fab City in Hyderabad.

Sources close to the development, in fact, say Moser Baer is contemplating not one but two projects, including the PV unit, at an investment of around Rs 3,000 crore. This may require further negotiations with Andhra Pradesh government on the issue of land and other incentives. The company recently announced the shipment of its photovoltaic cells and has orders and MoUs exceeding $100 million (around Rs 410 crore).

Setting up these units is said to be a part of the company's expansion plans, which also includes increasing the photovoltaic manufacturing capacity to 80 MW from the current 40 MW at its existing facility. The new unit is expected to be completed in a year.

At a conclusive meeting held here last week with state chief minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy, Moser Baer Chairman and Managing Director Deepak Puri discussed the company's expansion plans, land requirement and incentives for the PV cell manufacturing unit, highly-placed sources told Business Standard. It is also learnt that the state government had agreed to provide 75 acres of land at concessional rate in the Fab City along with power subsidy among other incentives.

The state government officials refused to give details about the investment and the proposed capacity of the manufacturing plant, stating it was the prerogative of the company, which also has to inform the stock exchanges before making any new announcement. Nevertheless, the officials indicated that a memorandum of understanding (MoU) was expected to be signed with Moser Baer on the proposed PV unit in a couple of weeks.

However, Moser Baer said the location of its proposed unit was not yet finalised. "We have not decided on any particular state. We are in the talks with several state governments and have not taken a final decision in this regard," said a company spokesperson. Meanwhile, the state government's investment promotion board cleared a similar project of solar semiconductor, proposed to be set up in Fab City.