On February 27, 2025, JinkoSolar (SH688223, stock price 6.90 yuan, market value 69.04 billion yuan), Trina Solar (SH688599, stock price 17.35 yuan, 37.81 billion yuan), Canadian Solar (SH688472, stock price 11.02 yuan, market value 40.64 billion yuan), Daqo Energy (SH688303, The share price is 21.38 yuan, and the market value is 45.86 billion yuan) 4 leading photovoltaic companies on the Science and Technology Innovation Board released their 2024 annual performance reports.

It is worth noting that Trina Solar has PV patent disputes with Canadian Solar, while JinkoSolar has frequent patent disputes with another PV leader, LONGi Green Energy (SH601012, stock price 16.71 yuan, market value 126.6 billion yuan).

The performance of 4 companies declined overall

According to the performance report, in terms of operating income, in 2024, JinkoSolar will achieve revenue of 92.621 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 21.96%; Trina Solar achieved revenue of 80.334 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 29.15%; Canadian Solar achieved revenue of 46.161 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 10.03%; Daqo Energy achieved revenue of 7.411 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 54.62%.

From the perspective of net profit attributable to the parent company, in 2024, JinkoSolar's net profit attributable to the parent company will be 90.5409 million yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 98.78%; Trina Solar's net profit attributable to the parent company was a loss of 3.455 billion yuan, a year-on-year loss, and Canadian Solar's net profit attributable to the parent company was 2.291 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 21.09%. Daqo Energy's net profit attributable to the parent company was a loss of 2.718 billion yuan, a year-on-year loss.

It can be seen that in addition to the small decline in Canadian Solar's performance, the performance of JinkoSolar, Trina Solar and Daqo Energy has declined significantly, especially Trina Solar and Daqo Energy, which have suffered losses in net profit attributable to the parent company.

Canadian Solar said in the introduction of the results: the explosive growth and profit contribution of the company's overseas large-scale energy storage business have played a good supporting role; The company took the initiative to reduce the shipment of photovoltaic products, prioritized profits, continued to reduce costs and increase efficiency, continuously improved management capabilities, and maintained the company's operational stability and financial health; The company makes full use of its international capabilities and global brand channels to capture and mine high-margin orders on a global scale to achieve profitability.

Canadian Solar also said that the company's second main business of large-scale energy storage has consolidated its growth curve, and a large number of energy storage project reserves and contract orders in hand have entered the harvest period in the early stage, and the company's first-mover advantage in the field of overseas large-scale energy storage leads the industry, and the overseas energy storage business has blossomed in major global large-scale energy storage markets such as North America, Europe and Oceania, and the shipment of energy storage business will reach 6.5GWh (gigawatt hours) in 2024, a year-on-year increase of 505.28%. It is expected that the shipment scale of the company's large-scale energy storage business will further increase to 11GWh~13GWh in 2025, and continue to maintain rapid growth.

Trina Solar said that the company's module shipments continued to grow year-on-year, but the profitability of the module business declined due to the continuous decline in PV module prices during the reporting period, resulting in a loss in full-year operating results. At the same time, the company conducts impairment tests on long-term assets that show signs of impairment, and will make provision for asset impairment, which has a certain impact on performance.

In addition, as the only polysilicon company, Daqo Energy explained that the company has established an efficient and flexible production adjustment mechanism in combination with the maintenance window to achieve orderly production reduction and production control of some production lines. During the reporting period, the company achieved polysilicon production of 205,100 tons and sales volume of 181,400 tons, and the product inventory continued to maintain a reasonable level, and the proportion of N-type polysilicon production increased from 40% in 2023 to 70%.

Patent wars in the photovoltaic circle are frequent

Coincidentally, among the several listed companies that disclosed their 2024 performance reports on February 27, Trina Solar and Canadian Solar have a PV patent dispute.

After the market on February 10, Trina Solar announced that the company filed a lawsuit with the Jiangsu Provincial High People's Court due to a patent dispute. Trina Solar argued that the manufacture, offer and sale of photovoltaic modules and other products jointly implemented by Canadian Solar and its wholly-owned subsidiary, Changshu Canadian Solar Technology Co., Ltd., fell within the scope of protection of its patent, and that the exploitation of the patent in question by the two parties without permission seriously infringed the company's legitimate rights and interests and caused economic losses to it.

Therefore, Trina Solar requested the court to order Canadian Solar and its wholly-owned subsidiaries to immediately cease and desist from infringing the company's patents in question, and to immediately destroy all inventory of the allegedly infringing products and the equipment and related molds used to produce the relevant products.

At the same time, Trina Solar requested that Canadian Solar and its wholly-owned subsidiaries be ordered to jointly compensate the company for economic losses and punitive damages caused by its infringement, totaling 1.058 billion yuan.

At that time, Trina Solar said that it sued Canadian Solar for a core invention patent related to TOPCon, a photovoltaic cell technology. "Canadian Solar filed 12 invalidation cases against our nine patents in August 2024 and sued us in the Suzhou Intermediate People's Court in December, [and] asked the court to rule that it was not infringed." Trina Solar said.

However, on February 27, Qu Xiaohua, the founder, chairman and CEO of Canadian Solar, said that patents have become a weapon for some companies to "roll in". Qu Xiaohua also said: "Canadian Solar hereby promises that it will not and will not use litigation to resolve patent disputes first. ”

It is also reported that starting in 2025, JinkoSolar will initiate patent lawsuits against LONGi Green Energy in China, Japan, and Australia. On January 21, LONGi Green Energy also countersued JinkoSolar for patent infringement in the United States, and the related technology involved in the lawsuit was TOPCon.

Cover image source: Visual China