Meyer Burger reported total incoming orders of CHF 560.7 million (US$592 million) in 2017, an increase of 23% compared to the previous year and represented the highest level of incoming orders for the past six years.

The migration to PERC technology was noted to have been at a faster pace than previously expected with almost all standard mono-Si cell capacity expected to be switched to PERC by the end of 2018. Meyer Burger said that it its MAiA 2.1 platform was estimated to have taken around a 70% market share.

However, the migration of multi-Si cells to PERC was going at a slower pace due to degradation issues.

Meyer Burger also noted that although incoming orders in the first two months of 2018 were around CHF 36.2 million (US$38.2 million), order momentum was expected to pick up again during the course of the year as second tier cell producers would upgrade to PERC.

The order backlog at the end of 2017 was CHF 343.8 million (US$363 million), compared to CHF 244.5 million at the end of 2016. The book-to-bill ratio (incoming orders to net sales) was 1.18, up from 1.01 in 2016.

Net sales in 2018 increased by 4% to CHF 473.3 million (US$499.8 million) in 2017.

R&D spending was CHF 43.4 million (US$45.8 million) in 2017, accounting for 9.2% of net sales, slightly less (CHF 46.7 million) that was spent in 2016. The lower spending was partially due to a reduction in R&D personnel, declining to 232, compared to 307 in 2016. The company has undertaken a number of restructuring activities in 2017.