CHINA kills all non Sol-Ark branded DEYE unit in the USA this morning.

[James Showalter]

Ethics-wise you are literally shutting down equipment homeowners paid for and depend on to fit some twisted business strategy.
literally seeing dozens of people call me all morning, and I never even sold Deye

EDIT 11/19/24
After this issue has turned out to be a strategy to disable and "brick" inverters that were not the listed USA partner brand (and hilariously bricked some USA branded units by accident showing their total control over all their hardware) EG4 and Luxpowertek released a joint statement signed by both company owners re-affirming the absolute rights of the end users.

 

[Mattb4]

Whoa! Now that is really bad.

 

[Tulex]

Sol-Ark has a contract with China. They have a right to hold China to that contract.
The hardware Sol-Ark sells is not affected.
China has no power over Sol-Ark, just the opposite. Sol-Ark has the power to hold China to the contracts.

 

[agtcovert]

Wow. Wonder if your unit stayed off the internet if this happened?

I'd say unbelievable, but...it's not.

 

[agtcovert]

Sol-Ark has a contract with China. They have a right to hold China to that contract.
The hardware Sol-Ark sells is not affected.
China has no power over Sol-Ark, just the opposite. Sol-Ark has the power to hold China to the contracts.

Was it 'China' or unscrupulous Ali* sellers? Still unacceptable, especially without any advance notice.

 

[kommando]

They have a right to hold China to that contract.

That will be an issue, the contract will be likely based on Chinese contract law and any action will need to be taken in a Chinese court with Chinese judges. Guess what way they will rule.

 

[Tulex]

Was it 'China' or unscrupulous Ali* sellers? Still unacceptable, especially without any advance notice.

The only people I feel bad for are those who truly didn't know that any Deye unit sold in America HAS to be a Sol-Ark.
This does suck in some ways, but how is Sol-Ark supposed to protect their interest if nothing else works?

 

[Tulex]

That will be an issue, the contract will be likely based on Chinese contract law and any action will need to be taken in a Chinese court with Chinese judges. Guess what way they will rule.

Sol-Ark has already won cases involving this. My guess is that if China went along with this, they know they have an issue.

 

[rhino]

The only people I feel bad for are those who truly didn't know that any Deye unit sold in America HAS to be a Sol-Ark.

That still seems like a scummy way of handling it.

 

[rhino]

Also goes to show you the fear of China controlling your Chinese manufactured and maintained system is a valid concern.

 

[Tulex]

That still seems like a scummy way of handling it.

That's why I edited my post to say that it does suck. I don't like it. But as a previous business owner, I understand it.

 

[rhino]

Wonder how exactly they are detecting this? Is the DEYE inverter phoning home and/or people using some on-line cloud based monitoring system and then they kill your inverter if the IP# is coming from USA?

 

[Johneb]

Thanks Solark for showing us all how much control the Chinese overlords have on the hardware you distribute.
Ethics-wise you are literally shutting down equipment homeowners paid for and depend on to fit some twisted business strategy. BE BETTER.
literally seeing dozens of people call me all morning, and I never even sold Deye

View attachment 256121

That’s another reason for my Outback inverter.

 

[Tulex]

Wonder how exactly they are detecting this? Is the DEYE inverter phoning home and/or people using some on-line cloud based monitoring system and then they kill your inverter if the IP# is coming from USA?

That's a very good question. Was it inevitable, or just for people doing it a certain way.
Sol-Ark went to home based monitoring, obviously part of this.

 

[CaliSunHarvester]

Wonder how exactly they are detecting this? Is the DEYE inverter phoning home and/or people using some on-line cloud based monitoring system and then they kill your inverter if the IP# is coming from USA?

Put the inverter behind a VPN and mask your location?

This makes me think again of getting SolarAssistent. My system works flawlessly, time to do something about that.

 

[Q-Dog]

If you contract a company to build a thing for you, then that company starts selling that same thing with their own name on it for less than you sell your version, would you be OK with that?

 

[kommando]

First job I do on my Chinese Solax inverters is install an ESP32 in place of the wifi dongle which disables the cloud data function and replaces it with an MQTT output to my Pi MQTT server where I collect the data locally.

 

[JWLV]

Put the inverter behind a VPN and mask your location?

This makes me think again of getting SolarAssistent. My system works flawlessly, time to do something about that.

They can tell where you are based on when you are generating power. They don't need an IP address.

 

[richwolf]

Thanks Solark for showing us all how much control the Chinese overlords have on the hardware you distribute.
Ethics-wise you are literally shutting down equipment homeowners paid for and depend on to fit some twisted business strategy. BE BETTER.
literally seeing dozens of people call me all morning, and I never even sold Deye

View attachment 256121

Pot calling the kettle black!

 

[JWLV]

Let me see if I got this right. After reading the messages above, this is my understanding of what happened.

Deye cloned Sol-Ark inverters without authorization
Sol-Ark (a US-based company) decided to disable unauthorized Deye inverters today
People in Pakistan, US, UK who own Deye inverters are screwed
So a US company is enforcing its intellectual property rights by disabling unauthorized clones.

Am I right about this?

 

[agtcovert]

Let me see if I got this right. After reading the messages above, this is my understanding of what happened.

Deye cloned Sol-Ark inverters without authorization
Sol-Ark (a US-based company) decided to disable unauthorized Deye inverters today
People in Pakistan, US, UK who own Deye inverters are screwed
So a US company is enforcing its intellectual property rights by disabling unauthorized clones.

Am I right about this?

Nope.

SolArk is a rebadged Deye. Deye is the OEM.
Deye bricked the inverters.

 

[Tulex]

Let me see if I got this right. After reading the messages above, this is my understanding of what happened.

Deye cloned Sol-Ark inverters without authorization
Sol-Ark (a US-based company) decided to disable unauthorized Deye inverters today
People in Pakistan, US, UK who own Deye inverters are screwed
So a US company is enforcing its intellectual property rights by disabling unauthorized clones.

Am I right about this?

I think it's more like...

Sol-Ark contracted with China company to sell their inverter here with stipulation that any inverter sold here by that company HAS to be a Sol-Ark. Much debate as to how much influence Sol-Ark had into the specs of the actual Sol-Ark inverter.
That company is allowing their version to be sold here.
Sol-Ark is saying you are violating the contract.

 

[sunshine_eggo]

Nope.

SolArk is a rebadged Deye. Deye is the OEM.

and

Dye contractually agreed to not sell their 120/240V units in Sol-Ark markets.

Deye bricked the inverters.

 

[Tulex]

Wonder if Sol-Ark will do a Deye trade in like SS....

 

[sunshine_eggo]

IMHO, the best course of action would be to hold Deye responsible, not the consumers. Dye should have to compensate Sol-Ark, not brick its customer's equipment.