Best Semiconductor Companies To Own For 2015

Best Semiconductor Companies To Own For 2015: Sunedison Inc (SUNE)

SunEdison Inc, formerly MEMC Electronic Materials, Inc., incorporated on October 1, 1984, is engaged in the development, manufacture and sale of silicon wafers. The Company is a developer and seller of photovoltaic energy solutions. Through Solar Materials and Solar Energy (SunEdison), it is a developer of solar energy projects. The Company operates in two segments: semiconductor materials and solar energy. The Company's Solar Energy segment includes the operations of its old Solar Materials segment, as well as its SunEdison business. In the Semiconductor Materials, the Company offers wafers with a variety of features. The Company's wafers vary in size, surface features, composition, purity levels, crystal properties and electrical properties.

Semiconductor Materials

The Company's monocrystalline wafers for use in semiconductor applications range in size from 100 millimeter to 300 millimeter and are round in shape for semiconductor custome rs because of the nature of their processing equipment. Its wafers are used as the starting material for the manufacture of various types of semiconductor devices, including microprocessor, memory, logic and power devices. In turn, these semiconductor devices are used in computers, cellular phones and other mobile electronic devices, automobiles and other consumer and industrial products. Its monocrystalline wafers for semiconductor applications include four general categories of wafers: prime, epitaxial, test/monitor and silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafers.

The Company's prime wafer is a polished, pure wafer with an ultraflat and ultraclean surface. The Company's epitaxial (epi), wafers consist of a thin silicon layer grown on the polished surface of the wafer. Typically, the epitaxial layer has different electrical properties from the underlying wafer. Th! is provides customers with isolation between circuit elements than a polished wafer. Its AEGIS product is design ed for certain specialized applications requiring high resis! tivity epitaxial wafers and its MDZ product feature. The AEGIS wafer includes a thin epitaxial layer grown on a standard starting wafer. The AEGIS wafer's thin epitaxial layer eliminates harmful defects on the surface of the wafer, thereby allowing device manufacturers to increase yields. The Company supplies test/monitor wafers to its customers for use in testing semiconductor fabrication lines and processes. An SOI wafer is a different starting material for the chip making process.

Solar Energy

The Company's Solar Energy segment provides solar energy services that integrate the design, installation, financing, monitoring, operations and maintenance portions of the downstream solar market to provide a solar energy service to its customers. As of December 31, 2012, SunEdison interconnected over 675 solar power systems representing 989 megawatt of solar energy generating capacity. As of December 31, 2012, SunEdison had 73 megawatt of projects und er construction and 2.6 gigawatts in pipeline. In support of its downstream solar business, its Solar Energy segment manufactures polysilicon, silicon wafers and solar modules. Additionally, its Solar Energy segment will sell solar modules to third parties in the event the opportunity aligns with itsinternal needs. It provides its downstream customers with a way to purchase renewable energy by delivering solar power under long-term power purchase arrangements with customers or feed-in tariff arrangements with government entities and utilities. Its SunEdison business is dependent upon government subsidies, including United States federal incentive tax credits, state-sponsored energy credits and foreign feed-in tariffs. The Company's solar wafers are used as the starting material for crystalline solar cells.

The Company competes with Shin-Etsu H! andotai, ! SUMCO, Siltronic and LG Siltron, SunPower Corporation, First Solar, Inc., Enerparc, Sharp Corporation (Recurre nt Energy), Phoenix Solar, BELECTRIC, JUWI Solar Gmbh, and S! olar City! .

Advisors' Opinion:

• [By Travis Hoium]

  Merchant power plants, which sell power to the electric grid at spot prices, are competitive in the market today. In Chile, SunEdison (NYSE: SUNE  ) built the 50 megawatt Maria Elena Project that was the largest merchant solar power plant until earlier this year when SunPower (NASDAQ: SPWR  ) completed its 70 megawatt Salvador Project. 

• [By Reuben Brewer]

  Investors cheered SunEdison Inc's (NYSE: SUNE  ) deal to jointly acquire First Wind for $2.4 billion with affiliated yieldco TerraForm Power Inc (NASDAQ: TERP  ) . And with good reason. It's a truly transformational deal that takes SunEdison's business to new levels. TerraForm will benefit along the way, too, which is why it's shares rose even further than SunEdison's 30% or so advance.

• [By Jayson Derrick]

  SunEdison (NYSE: SUNE) is in talks to invest $2 billion to build a low-cost polysilicon factory in China. The facility will have a capacity of 20,000 to 30,000 metric tons a year that can produce polysilicon for $2 per kilogram less than its rivals. Shares gained 6.81 percent, closing at $16.63.

• [By Anna Prior]

  SunEdison Inc.(SUNE) on Thursday said it completed its purchase of AES Corp.'s(AES) 50% ownership stake in the Silver Ridge Power LLC joint venture.

source from Top Stocks For 2015:http://www.topstocksblog.com/best-semiconductor-companies-to-own-for-2015-3.html