It has been an exciting 2021 for the PV industry so far. Full order books at our customers, shortages of glass for the production of solar modules, and supply bottlenecks for aluminium led to steadily rising prices, and even before the closure of the Suez Canal, the situation regarding the transportation of goods didn't look bright.

Despite our expectations in the last update, the circumstances will not change in the coming months. All of us, in business as well as in private life, are confronted with a very unusual situation due to Corona. Services are only available to a very limited extent due to contact restrictions and security requirements, in areas such as events and culture there have been complete shutdowns and as a result, there has been a sharp increase in consumption of for example entertainment electronics. As a result, there is global shortness of polysilicon, which is an essential component in the production of microelectronics and solar cells.

Our top priority is our customers. We try to procure sufficient goods in all possible ways and include additional suppliers and products in our portfolio to be able to offer a solution for every bottleneck and every transport-related delay. However, in the current situation of skyrocketing transportation costs (often on short notice), this means we are often faced with the decision of either taking the goods for a higher price than we originally purchased them, or refusing the goods and not having them transported to Europe in the first place. So stay flexible when choosing suitable products and let your customer advisors help you.

Of course, the situation is also a challenge for the end customer. Our CSO Jan Brunner, therefore, goes into detail in the video about various arguments you can use to explain rising costs to your customers and renegotiate prices. So it is worth taking a look at the short update video.