"A large number of financing deals" have been publicized recently, showing the will from companies and supporters to pursue PV solar projects, Velosa noted.

Solar independent power producers (IPP) including SunEdison are hot to tap into utilities' growing interest in solar power in the US and Canada, particularly big ones including Duke Energy and PG&E--and traditional IPPs are increasing their focus in this area too, according to Velosa. This focus from IPPs, as well as pressure on utilities to add renewable energy sources to their offerings, "is about to drastically change the nature of the PV market in North America," he writes.

Velosa expects to see more collaboration "up and down the value chain" in pursuit of the large utility-scale projects, and even more PV specialization in certain geographic regions leveraging relationships with local utilities and public utility commissions. There will still be a large and attractive market for end-user-hosted PV systems (especially given their shorter lifetimes), says Velosa, "but the big animals whose steps you can start to hear are the utility customers and the traditional IPP firms -- and their feet will change the dynamics and relationships between the PV vendors, the solar IPP firms, and their engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) partners."

(Read more Photovoltaics World at www.electroiq.com)