CCL has become the first UK distributor to stock Recom modules.
The companies announced the deal on the show floor of Solar Energy UK.
“We have pre-ordered product arriving next week based on the contract. We haven’t sat down and discussed volumes,” CCL managing director Paul R Brooks told Solar Power Portal at the event.
Brooks said that while the company would continue to stock Chinese modules, Recom's Malaysian manufactured products would protect it against further uncertainty surrounding the EU-China trade dispute.
“We do trade with one, in particular, of the Chinese companies. There is still some clarity required on pricing, we need to have firm pricing to know exactly where we are going. We still trade with the Chinese company but we feel Recom gives us a more solid base, there’s no antidumping issues and no volume issues,” said Brooks.
He expressed concern that the UK market had in recent years begun placing more emphasis on lower cost products.
“The UK market has gone towards selling on price. I think we have to sell at a fair price but retain the quality of the product. Cheap can be expensive. We can limit the liability by using quality products. There’s too many companies only interested in today. These systems have a 20 year lifespan, we need to protect that,” he urged.
“We’ve lost business in the past at the lower end of the market, we aim for the quality market. Recom gives us a good quality product at a fair price. We're bundling a lot of these modules into kits. The kit helps us take some of the cost away from installers by bundling inverters and BoS with the modules.”