Young Turks: Empowering India through solar power route

Q: Today solar energy is five times the cost of any other conventional source of energy. By what time are you looking to make money at Azure?

A: It is important to realize while this is expensive but our agreements are also in line with the cost structure. We generally do our projects that are green from year two.

But, we need to continue to invest more in R&D and growth of the market and business so we expect to start generating profits and paying more tax within a period of three - five years.

Q: How significant is R&D for a business like this? What have you designed for R&D art Azure and what is the kind of money that goes into creating these technologies.

A: 10% of our budget is allocated towards R&D and R&D is about focusing on technologies that will reduce the cost of generation. We do not manufacture anything in house but we invest in picking the right technologies.

Q: Is there a plant to set up a manufacturing facility in India?

A: Definitely. I think we have plans of doing that but, at this point more focused on creating good assets. Also there is a lot of competition out in the market on different types of technologies.

When we are ready to place on one technology then we will consider manufacturing. At this point we want to pick what is more appropriate for a given project.

Q: What you're your future plans? How many megawatts of power are you looking to generate - what are your growth targets?

A: Our focus has always been like to get to 100 megawatt. Our portfolio of 100 megawatts by year 2014, 2013 is all we intend to do. We expect to do 70:30, 70 megawatt in utility and 30 megawatt in commercial sector.

Q: How many projects are we talking about?

A: Roughly we are talking about 20 to 30 projects. Rajasthan, Punjab, Haryana, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Meghalaya and Karnataka are the states that we have been active in.

Q: By when can we see solar power at parity as any other source of power?

A; 2020.