PV Tech: The Global Solar Photovoltaics News Service from London

PV Tech is a London-based news service covering the international solar photovoltaic industry, from polysilicon and cell manufacturing through to utility-scale power plants, finance and policy. Published at pv-tech.org by Solar Media, it describes itself as a leading source of in-depth, up-to-the-minute news on the solar PV supply chain internationally. For manufacturers, developers, investors and policymakers working in solar energy, it is one of the trade press titles that defines the daily agenda.

Unlike general energy publications, PV Tech concentrates on a single technology family and follows it along the whole value chain. A reader may find, on the same day, a report on a new tracker product for extreme wind conditions, a financing deal for a Spanish solar portfolio, a policy decision in the United States and analysis of manufacturing capacity in China. That supply-chain breadth, maintained over more than a decade and a half, is the foundation of its authority.

Overview

PV Tech combines a rolling news wire with technical journals, premium analysis and a major international events programme. Its own about page states that the website was launched in 2009 and attracted more than 2.5 million visits a year, according to 2023 analytics figures quoted there, with the largest audiences in the United States, China, the United Kingdom, India, Germany, Australia, Canada, Singapore and Brazil. That geography mirrors the solar industry itself, which is manufactured largely in Asia, financed heavily in Europe and North America and deployed worldwide.

The service employs journalists based in Europe, North America and China, allowing it to report across time zones and to cover both Western markets and the Chinese manufacturing base that dominates global module supply. Its output ranges from short breaking-news items to long-form premium interviews and market analysis sold through subscription.

History and Founding

PV Tech was launched in 2009, at a formative moment for the modern solar industry, when feed-in tariffs in Europe were driving rapid deployment and manufacturing was scaling quickly in Asia. The title grew out of Solar Media's wider publishing activity for the solar sector, which included Photovoltaics International, described by the publisher as the solar industry's first and most authoritative technical journal, distributed internationally to more than 12,500 decision-makers responsible for producing solar cells, modules, thin films and utility-scale plants.

A significant redesign followed in December 2016, when a new-look PV Tech was launched in response to a reader survey, integrating the technical journal content more closely with the news site. By then the brand had already expanded downstream: PV Tech Power, launched in 2015, was created for the downstream sector, covering project design and construction, yield performance and finance, complementing the upstream manufacturing focus of the original title.

Ownership and Leadership

PV Tech is published by Solar Media, the London-based specialist publisher and events organiser for the solar and energy storage industries. Solar Media also publishes sister title Energy-Storage.news and runs an extensive portfolio of conferences. Recent PV Tech reporting refers to Solar Media as part of the Informa Group, placing the title within one of the world's largest business-to-business media and events groups while it continues to operate under its specialist Solar Media identity.

Editorially, the title is led by its own team of solar journalists and analysts rather than by general energy reporters. Its premium offering, interviews and event coverage draw on that specialist staff and on contributions from market research firms, consultancies and senior industry executives. The publisher's events, including the long-running Solar Finance & Investment Europe conference in London, are closely integrated with the editorial brand, with PV Tech journalists moderating and reporting the sessions.

Services and Distribution

The core service is the pv-tech.org news site, updated throughout the day with company, technology, market and policy news. Alongside free news, PV Tech operates a premium subscription tier offering expert industry analysis and interviews, digital access to the PV Tech Power journal and discounts on events, marketed with introductory trial pricing. Print and digital journals remain part of the mix: Photovoltaics International serves the manufacturing community, while PV Tech Power serves developers, asset owners and financiers downstream.

Distribution is therefore multi-channel. Breaking news reaches readers through the website and its newsletters, deeper technical material through the journals, and face-to-face intelligence through conferences. For advertisers and sponsors, the publisher offers access to a concentrated professional audience of solar decision-makers, a model typical of high-value trade media in the energy sector.

Coverage Areas

Manufacturing coverage follows the full production chain: polysilicon, wafers, ingots, cells and modules, together with critical components such as glass, frames, inverters and trackers. Reports on factory openings, capacity expansions, technology roadmaps and supply agreements sit alongside product reviews and technical analysis. The annual PV CellTech conference, run since 2016, is devoted specifically to this manufacturing agenda, with a United States edition addressing the growth of domestic American solar manufacturing.

Downstream, PV Tech reports on project development, power purchase agreements, mergers and acquisitions, project finance and asset performance. Recent examples include European developers refinancing portfolios and adding battery storage, developers signing hundreds of megawatts of PPAs with railway operators, and analysis of execution and grid-connection risks as the United Kingdom's solar market matures. Policy coverage spans auctions, permitting, trade measures and grid reform in the major solar markets.

Digital Platforms

The website is the centre of the operation, organised around news, analysis, features and premium content, with event pages woven into article footers so that readers of a finance story are pointed to the relevant Solar Media conference. Video interviews, webinars and sponsored content extend the platform beyond text. Social and newsletter distribution carry headlines to an international professional readership that rarely visits a homepage directly.

The integration of journals into the digital platform, completed in its modern form with the 2016 relaunch, means subscribers can move between daily news and the longer technical record of Photovoltaics International and PV Tech Power in one place. That archive depth is a competitive asset: few newer digital entrants can match a continuous specialist record stretching back to 2009.

Clients and Media Partners

PV Tech's commercial relationships are with the solar industry itself: manufacturers, developers, independent power producers, financiers and technology suppliers that advertise, sponsor events and subscribe to premium content. Its conference programmes attract infrastructure funds, institutional investors, asset managers, banks and development platforms, particularly at Solar Finance & Investment Europe, which the publisher notes annually draws the leading figures in European renewables investment to London.

Editorial partnerships take the form of analyst contributions, event panels and interviews. Market research and consultancy voices, such as Wood Mackenzie analysts appearing at Solar Media's Energy Storage Summit, feature in its reporting, reflecting a trade-press ecosystem in which publishers, analysts and industry executives share platforms while the newsroom retains its reporting role.

Notable Work

The PV CellTech conference series is among the brand's most notable extensions. Running since 2016 and dedicated to cell and module manufacturing technology, it brings together producers, equipment suppliers, investors and researchers to debate the future of PV production. Its United States edition, held in the San Francisco Bay Area, reflects the reshoring of American solar manufacturing and PV Tech's role in documenting that shift.

The journals also constitute notable work in their own right. Photovoltaics International's long run as a technical journal for cell and module producers gave the brand credibility in engineering circles that pure news sites struggle to earn, while PV Tech Power applied the same treatment to downstream project performance and finance from 2015 onward.

Recent Developments

Recent PV Tech coverage reflects an industry preoccupied with the co-location of battery storage with solar, volatile power prices in markets such as Spain, and the financing of ever-larger portfolios. Reporting from the Energy Storage Summit 2026 in London, hosted by Solar Media, examined whether co-located storage is overhyped as a remedy for underperforming solar assets, while project news tracked multi-hundred-million-dollar refinancings and gigawatt-scale tracker supply agreements in markets from South Africa to Texas.

The events calendar continues to expand, with Solar Media listing conferences in London, Málaga, Warsaw and Istanbul, and the Solar Finance & Investment Europe event returning for a fourteenth edition in London in February 2027 under the expanded Solar & Storage Finance name. For a title launched in 2009 as a website, PV Tech's evolution into a combined news, journals, premium data and global events business illustrates how specialist energy media has adapted to serve an industry that has become central to the world economy.