Wacker Chemie AG, a division of which - Wacker Polysilicon - is one of the world's leading manufacturers of the silicon feedstock to the solar industry, has just announced preliminary business results for fiscal 2007, which show another record year in terms of sales and earnings. The Munich-based chemical company boosted its sales by 13 percent to EUR3.78bn (2006: EUR3.34bn), thanks chiefly to volume gains and higher product prices.

What interests us though is the Polysilicon division. According to the same press release "In 2007, WACKER POLYSILICON benefited from both price and production-volume increases, the latter stemming from expanded hyperpure polycrystalline silicon capacity. Polysilicon output rose 30 percent against 2006, reaching 8,100 metric tons. Based on preliminary figures, WACKER POLYSILICON expects to post full-year sales of EUR457m for 2007 (2006: EUR325.6m), a rise of 40 percent."

Wacker is in a very nice spot, because they are one of the top 3 producers of polysilicon in the world. I haven't been able to obtain 2007 figures, but in 2006, global polysilicon production was 36,000 tons, half of which went to the solar industry. Assuming 2007 production grew at the same rate as Wacker, output was probably just under 50,000 tons and more than half of that went to the solar industry. That would suggest that Wacker has something like a 20% market share.