Though it may seem like just a short time ago, two decades of incredible renewables industry growth have passed since then. Our core focus shifted when, in November , we decided to organize our very first event: a trade mission to Spain that was aimed at exploring the promise of the nascent Spanish solar market.
Our founder, Edwin Koot, was even close to calling the whole thing off, were it not for the arrival of a single, liberating registration form arriving by fax machine at a crucial decision moment, which convinced him to pull through and kicked off a streak of events and counting.
The trade mission was a success and led us to immediately start exploring other potential markets for the concept. At that moment in time - basically the dawn of the true global solar boom - the Chinese market seemed far more than half a world away. But its promise loomed large and word of the ramp-up of its manufacturing capacity was starting to reach Europe.
Mind you, this was when European and American manufacturers still dominated the production of PV modules, and Chinese solar manufacturers were only just getting started. With contacts and knowledge obtained from writing an extensive report on the Chinese market, Edwin started mapping out a business tour to China.
He managed to put together a packed program of meetings and factory visits and assembled a group of European and American investors and developers eager to get a peak of what was rumored to become the big new frontier of solar product development. During that week in April , the visits to the facilities, and meetings with high officials, of companies like Suntech, LDK Solar, Trina Solar, and Yingli were extremely fruitful.
