万向集团对消费者耳熟能详的要数他们的自动化供应业务，中国这个拥有数十亿资产的合资集团已经开始迈进光伏领域。万向集团在国内已经成为了太阳能硅铸锭和硅产量最大的企业之一。公司还在2005年开始了一些电池和组件生意，计划明后年达产300MW的产容。现在万象太阳能集团已经在美国开始生产发展，公司有4000个员工，但是直到最近才开始进入到美国本土的光伏领域。
万向集团拥有了伊利诺斯州2百万美元的补助金和光伏政策的鼓励，还有来自土耳其Spire Solar公司的技术专家的专业支持，万向集团在芝加哥已经开始了多晶硅组件生产线生产。此外公司还得到了州政府的4百万美元的资助，并与Mew Generation Power 达成太阳能伙伴关系，并计划开始在伊利诺斯州建设62MW的光伏能源电站。
The Wanxiang Group may be a familiar name to those in the automotive parts supply business, but the multibillion-dollar Chinese conglomerate has stayed off—or at least on the screen-edge of—most solar PV observers’ radar. Yet the company is one of the largest solar silicon ingot and wafer producers in China. It also started a cell and module business in 2005, with plans to get to 300MW of capacity in the next year or so. Wanxiang has been operating in the U.S. for awhile, with more than 4000 employees, but had not dipped its toe in the Stateside solar pond until recently.
With the help of more than $2 million in Illinois state grants and incentives as well as the turnkey technical expertise of Spire Solar, Wanxiang Solar has opened a crystalline-silicon module line in the Chicago suburb of Rockford. But that’s not all: the new division, benefiting from another $4 million in state funds, has joined with New Generation Power to form Rockford Solar Partners, with plans to build a prodigious 62MW PV power-generation plant in Illinois.
