Central Electronics Limited (CEL), a public sector enterprise under the Ministry of Science and Technology, has invited bids for the supply of 1.5 million multicrystalline solar cells of 4.63 W output or higher.

As per the tender documents, the solar cell should be five busbars in length and 156.75 x 156.75 mm +/-0.25 mm or 157 x 157 mm +/-0.25 mm in dimension. The cells must be 200 ± 20 microns in thickness with a wattage of ≥4.63 W.

The last date to submit the bids is August 16, 2022. Bids will be opened on the same day.

Bidders are not required to submit any earnest money deposit for the tender.

The cells must be free of any cracks, holes, cuts, smudges, patches, spots, edge chipping, discontinuity of metal printing lines, or color mismatches. The cells should have a homogeneous silicon nitride coating without any color variations. The packing of the cells should be in lots of 100 cells or per the vendors’ standard size.

Only original manufacturers or their authorized representatives with valid authorization from the original manufacturers will be eligible to participate in the tender.

The bidder must confirm that the modules manufactured using the supplier’s cells comply with IEC 61215/IS 14286, IEC 61730, and IEC 62804 standards.

The vendor should have a minimum of 30 MW/annum in-house multicrystalline solar cell manufacturing capacity.

CEL has stated that if the defective cells are less than 3% of the overall supplied lot, all such cells would be replaced free of cost. The whole lot will be rejected if the faulty cells are more than 3%.

Before the bid opening date, the bidders must supply samples of 200 solar cells at CEL for test and evaluation. The sample cells will be checked at CEL.

In the case of a split tender, the micro and small enterprises (MSEs) quoting price within a price band of L1 (lowest)+15% would be allowed to supply a portion up to 20% of the requirement by bringing down their price to L1 price where L1 is non-MSE price.

If the price quoted by an MSE is within L1+15% and such MSE is L4 (fourth lowest) or higher (provided L1, L2, and L3 are not MSEs), then the splitting of quantities will be done as MSE bidder-20% and other bidders-80% of the tender quantity.

In June this year, CEL announced a tender to supply 1.5 million multicrystalline solar cells with a wattage output of 4.68 W or higher.

Earlier, CEL invited bids for the supply of one million multicrystalline solar cells of 4.68 W output or higher.

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