OCI mulls 25,000-ton expansion for polysilicon plant in Malaysia

Is the polysilicon industry on the road to overcapacity again? Or will demand continue to exceed all expectations?

In any case, South Korean OCI Company, the world’s third-largest polysilicon producer, has announced that it considers expanding the capacity of its polysilicon plant in Malaysia by 20,000 to 25,000 metric tons (MT).

At the presentation of OCI’s third quarter results on November 1, CEO WooHyun Lee said that the company would discuss supply and demand with its key customers before making a decision: “Once we feel comfortable and confident about the market growth and supply and demand statistics, then we will go ahead with the expansion.”

OCI acquired the plant in Malaysia from Japanese Tokuyama Corporation in May 2017. Deviating from his presentation slide (image above), Lee said that OCI would “like to immediately improve” the plant’s current nameplate capacity of 13,800 MT to 16,000 MT and “wish that the Malaysian factory can reach 20,000 MT annual capacity by next year.”

An expansion by 25,000 MT would then increase the plant’s capacity to 45,000 MT. Including 52,000 MT in South Korea, OCI’s total polysilicon production capacity would thus reach 97,000 MT.