Statement

An interview with the managing directors of FATH Solar, Mirko Jan and Wido Fath.

Question: How did FATH come to the Solar theme? By profession you are actually injection founders and produce industrial assembly components.

WF: From the very beginning of our company we have tried to act in an responsible manner. This does not only refer to our employees but also to the environment. We have achieved this with our company building, with the block type thermal power station and the timber construction. It is our aim to implement environmental measures in all we do.

MJF: At first we thought of wind energy which, in part, is quite profitable in this region. However, to simply buy, install and operate such a plant seemed not enough to us as we really wanted to use our core competencies. And, eventually, solar technologies became more and more popular.

Question: And then you simply started to develop mounting systems for solar plants?

WF: No, no. We didn't encounter that issue that blue-eyed. What might not be obvious to all: a large part of our sales volume comes from sliding blocks for profile systems. This is where we have a real good market position...

MJF:  ...we know every profile ever made...

WF: ...and some of our parts have been used one-to-one for the rail system with which the modules are mounted on the roof. Because there was the growth market, we have had a closer look at these systems. And so it soon became clear that this represented a vast potential for improvements.

MJF: It became apparent that companies mainly concentrated on these new techniques, i.e. panels, electronics, the entire monitoring system. Consequently, nobody really concentrated on such banal things such as mounting systems. It was just to last. We had good luck to find someone very fast who had already been involved in the solar segment for a long time and who had already intensely concentrated on the mechanical side. This particular persons had to become one of our team members.

Question:  How does the customer benefit from coming to you?

MJF: We know for sure that we have very good assembly solutions both in technical and economic aspects. Better solutions than offered on the market so far. Our in-roof system can possibly be called pathbreaking since we work with glued frameless modules. Thus, one has optimum optical characteristics and the interlocking system is real tight.

WF: Beyond that, we have established a real interesting network. With it we can also support our customers in projecting and implementing the entire project.

Frage: So I wish you good luck and all the best in future! Thank you very much for the interview.