Navitas Solar plans ₹10,000 crore investment over five years

Navitas Solar will invest ₹10,000 crore over the next five years across the solar value chain, Business Standard reported on Thursday. The Gujarat-based company makes solar modules and has been expanding its manufacturing base in the country.

The plan covers more than one stage of the chain. That means the money is not going only into module assembly, but into the wider set of activities that turn raw material into a finished panel and get it to a project site.

The company did not spell out, in the report, how the ₹10,000 crore will be split between these stages or where the new capacity will come up.

Why the value chain matters

India's solar buildout has leaned heavily on imported cells and wafers. Module assembly grew fast. Upstream steps, polysilicon, ingots, wafers, cells, stayed thin. A company that moves into those stages is betting on domestic demand holding up and on policy support for local manufacturing.

Navitas is not the only one making that bet. Several Indian firms have announced integrated plans in the past few years, drawn by production-linked incentives and by basic customs duties on imported cells and modules.

The size of this commitment stands out. ₹10,000 crore over five years is a large number for a company of Navitas' scale, and it will need a mix of debt, equity and internal accruals to fund it.

What's not known yet

• Which states will host the new plants
• How much capacity will be added at each stage
• Whether the investment includes any overseas operations
• The funding mix and timeline for each phase

Business Standard did not carry a detailed quote from company officials on the breakdown of the spending.

Solar manufacturing in India has seen a wave of announcements since 2021. Some have moved to construction. Others are still on paper. Execution is where the sector's record is mixed, land, power tariffs, skilled labour and the availability of polysilicon have all slowed projects down.

Navitas, based in Surat, has been in the module business for over a decade. Its move up the chain would put it in competition with larger players who have already started cell and wafer lines.

The five-year window puts the completion target around 2031. By then, India's solar capacity addition is expected to be well past the 100 GW mark, and domestic content rules for government-backed projects will likely be tighter than they are now.

That's the backdrop for the Navitas plan. The company has put a number on its ambition. The rest, sites, timelines, partners, is still to come.