SMA has affirmed its status as the preferred PV inverter solutions provider in North America by reaching 7.5 GW of installed inverter capacity. Leading researchers calculate the U.S. installed base to be more than 20 GW as of the end of the first half of 2015, and the total North American market to be near 22 GW over the same time frame. That means more than a third of all PV systems installed in the U.S., Canada and Mexico are powered by SMA inverters. Combined, they produce enough energy to provide roughly 1.5 million average American homes with clean, renewable energy. These milestones are the result of SMA’s long-standing—and on-going—commitment to the North American PV market.
“SMA entered North America nearly 15 years ago and we are proud to have created hundreds of new jobs here,” said Pierre-Pascal Urbon, SMA chief executive officer. “SMA has a long-standing commitment to this market and we will continue to produce high-quality inverters and to serve local PV designers, installers, developers, owners and EPCs well into the future.”
The company’s North American sales and service operations were launched in 2001 with the founding of SMA America in Grass Valley, California. In 2009, SMA opened a production facility in Denver, which was the second largest solar inverter manufacturing plant in the world at the time. A year later, SMA Canada was founded to support the growing Ontario market. SMA furthered its commitment to North America with the formation of the U.S. Technology Group in 2013, also located in Denver, which includes product development and local engineering. That same year, SMA opened the doors to its Solar Monitoring Center in support of its entry into the O&M market.
To date, nearly half a million SMA inverters have been selected for the most productive, technologically advanced PV systems in North America, making SMA the preferred inverter supplier for projects of all sizes and applications.
“We are honored that so many PV professionals have trusted SMA for the most critical part of their power plants,” said Marko Wittich, SMA executive vice president of sales for the Americas region. “By partnering with SMA, they have made a commitment to lasting reliability and productivity, which are vital for all PV systems. Our inverters fulfill the highest quality standards and perform excellently even under the harshest conditions.”
