UK solar distributor Midsummer Energy says its sales figures have doubled in the last year on the back of negotiating key supply partnerships.
And, as a result of the boom in business, the firm has had to bolster the headcount at its Cambridge-based offices.
Earlier this year Midsummer became an official SolarEdge distribution partner, adding the company’s range of inverters to other products from the likes of Hanwha Q Cells, Growatt, Myenergi and Solfit.
Jamie Vaux, commercial director at Midsummer, said the company had also placed a more strategic focus on battery storage, bringing in a dedicated technology engineer in order to cater for demand.
C&I solar and battery storage markets are also remaining strong, Vaux said.
“There are sensible returns available at the commercial scale now and the substantial panel price drops this year have helped with that. We keep strong stocks of tier one poly, but since the gap between mono PERC and poly continues to close I think that increasingly people will weigh up the hardware and labour saving of a higher output panel and we'll see more mono in commercial PV.”
The firm also landed a lucrative supply contract from energy supplier E.On to help provide for its domestic solar-plus-storage business, launched to much fanfare last year.
But Vaux was also mindful of the challenges that lie ahead, starting with the levels of uncertainty the industry currently faces while the government considers its post-April 2019 regulatory landscape and how that might impact on demand.
“We've made online and mobile kit ordering very easy and domestic kits are still our bread and butter, but now we need to really emphasise self-consumption technologies for a post-subsidy market.
“EV chargers are already selling really well for us and the smart functionality of the Zappi [from Myenergi] makes a lot of sense. Increasingly people want a full energy management system and there are exciting things happening in that space.”
Midsummer Energy is just one of more than 80 exhibitors at this year’s Solar & Storage Live exhibition, which runs from 16 – 18 October 2018 at Birmingham’s NEC. More information on the exhibition and details on how to register entirely for free can be found here.