INDUSTRY JEWEL : Daniel Liu, Managing Director-South and Central Asia, JinkoSolar

Education and Background:

Mr Daniel Liu completed his graduation in Material Science in the year 2006. He also holds a Masters’ Degree in Nuclear Technology from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, conferred on him in the year 2010.

Work experience:

He started his career in the year 2010 as a Business Development Manager at GE. After a four-year stint, he moved to Ford Motor Company as a Product Marketing Executive. The budding entrepreneur within him led to the co-founding of Baying 365, where he served as the CEO.

Presently, Daniel is handling the role of Managing Director-South & Central Asia at JinkoSolar, a global leader in the solar module manufacturing segment, accounting for the largest global market share for three consecutive years.

Current Work Goals and Achievements:

Daniel has been instrumental in steering JinkoSolar to success within the industry and the region(s). He has led the team in India with the passion to achieve one milestone after another enabling the organization to capture the highest market share at a phenomenal pace and in a very limited time frame. JinkoSolar was the number one supplier to India in 2020 with more than 1.2 GW of shipments accounting for a 22% market share, which is the highest by any module manufacturer till date. Under his guidance, the company spearheaded the technology shift from poly to mono, making it more popular and widely accepted amongst customers in India.

He endeavors to lead the renewables energy transition, as part of a key equipment supplier company, by introducing and promoting cutting-edge technology which benefits the end customers and the entire solar value chain.

Industry Outlook:

India, being one of the largest individual solar market, will depend on new PV technologies as the most important change agent to push up renewable composition in its generation mix as well as bring down the cost of energy significantly. We appreciate the aggressive targets set by the India Government in terms of RE capacity addition and the constant steps that are being taken in order to achieve the projected numbers. Solar will play an important role in contributing to the carbon neutrality initiative taken up by most of the big and medium corporates and achieving RPO targets set by the different state and central authorities. All the players are gathering their paces to follow this trend and expand their footprint in this huge market. We are already seeing a huge technology shift to mono in 2021.

Last year, was difficult for everyone as the whole world faced and fought a pandemic. The challenges it brought were unique and urged all of us to put our best foot forward and come out of this stronger and smarter. Other than this, what was critical last year and still might have some impact in the first half of 2021 was the disruption in raw material pricing – Glass being the primary player there. Polysilicon, the major raw material for modules, also faced some serious shortage due to mishaps that led to demand-supply gap. To add to this, container shortage and the resulting uptick in freight and transportation charges made the situation worse. It would be interesting to see how the industry responds to the above and other post COVID challenges. From a regulatory point of view, a proactive approach by agencies on clearing PPA backlog and signing timely PSAs with DISCOMs would also be key for instilling the necessary confidence in developers and fostering the auctions and installations in 2021.

JinkoSolar is committed to revolutionizing the energy mix and taking responsibility to ensure a sustainable future. With 9 global production facilities and 21 overseas subsidiaries, JinkoSolar distributes its solar products and sells its solutions and services to a diversified international utility, commercial and residential customer base in more than 90 countries including China, United States, Japan, Germany, United Kingdom, Chile, South Africa, India, Mexico, Brazil, the United Arab Emirates, Italy, Spain, France, Belgium, and other countries and regions. JinkoSolar has built a vertically integrated solar product value chain, with an integrated annual capacity of 20 GW for mono wafers, 11GW for solar cells and 25 GW for solar modules, as of September 30, 2020.

“Quality is a core competence of JinkoSolar. Our customers have expectations for the technology, performance, reliability of their panels and value of the services they are offered, and that will hold even more true in the era of grid parity.” This is something that Jinko Solar takes very seriously and this enables us to do innovative stuff and pave the path for the industry to follow.