Pomerantz Secures Record-Setting $172.5 Million Settlement for Danaher Investors
On August 26, 2026, Pomerantz secured final court approval of a $55 million settlement on behalf of investors in SolarEdge Technologies, Inc. (“SolarEdge”) in a nationwide class action against the company, its then-CEO Zvi Lando, then-CFO Ronen Faier, then-Director of Investor Relations and Finance Operations Lior Danziger, and Head of Investor Relations J.B. Lowe (“Defendants”).
Partner Brian Calandra led the Pomerantz team that litigated the action in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. The Plaintiffs alleged that between February 13, 2023, and October 19, 2023, both dates inclusive (the “Class Period”) Defendants violated Sections 10(b) and 20(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Rule 10b-5 promulgated thereunder by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
SolarEdge is an Israel-based company that designs, develops, manufactures, and sells inverter solutions for solar energy systems. Its “customers” are primarily distributors, wholesalers, and installers who “sell through.” Europe is by far the company’s most important region, producing 64% of the company’s revenues in 2023, and analysts characterized SolarEdge’s European business as a prime reason to invest in the company.
By the start of the Class Period, however, demand in Europe for SolarEdge products had been in decline for months, and channel inventories were rising. In fact, Pomerantz’s investigation, which involved multiple investigators and spanned four continents, unearthed confidential witnesses who described how SolarEdge was aware of and discussed the demand slowdown as early as July 2022, well before the Class Period. In addition, declining European demand was reflected in SolarEdge’s inventories and channel inventories, which were skyrocketing.
Rather than disclose the truth to investors, however, Defendants continued to conceal declining demand in Europe and the reasons underlying soaring inventory levels—even in response to skeptical analysts. For example, on an earnings call with analysts and investors in February 2023, Lando boasted that “we continue to see very strong demand from Europe for all products and relatively low inventory levels in the channel” and “in many cases, we see that the demand is far exceeding our ability to manufacture and deliver.” Similarly, Lando assured attendees on a similar call two months later, in May 2023, that “we don’t see right now a change in the pattern of demand in the market in Europe,” and continued to communicate that demand in Europe was growing, when it was not.
The truth—that demand in Europe had been declining, and inventories were saturated—began to emerge on August 1, 2023, when Defendants acknowledged that SolarEdge’s European distributors were “experiencing higher-than-optimal” channel inventories and that “growth in demand has tapered off.” Although Lando emphasized—including in response to direct questions from analysts—that these developments were mere hiccups, he reduced SolarEdge’s revenue “guidance,” and the company’s share price fell 18.3%. The truth fully emerged on October 19, 2023, when SolarEdge issued a press release disclosing that “[d]uring the second part of the third quarter of 2023, we experienced substantial unexpected cancellations and pushouts of existing backlog from our European distributors” and, as a result, third quarter revenue guidance was further lowered by approximately another 17%. The company’s share price plummeted again.
Defendants moved to dismiss the Plaintiffs’ complaint on the grounds that it failed to allege the existence of misleading statements or the Defendants’ scienter (i.e., knowledge of wrongdoing or an intent to deceive, manipulate, or defraud). In December 2024, the Court denied that motion in part, holding that the Plaintiffs had sufficiently alleged that the Defendants’ statements describing inventory levels as “low” were misleading and made with scienter, but that no other statements were sufficiently alleged to be misleading.
Undaunted, the Plaintiffs filed a second amended complaint (“SAC”) that expanded upon the allegations of their earlier complaint by further detailing declining demand in Europe and the Defendants’ knowledge or reckless disregard of that declining demand. The Defendants moved to dismiss the SAC, but the Court denied that motion in substantial part, holding that the Plaintiffs had now sufficiently alleged that the Defendants had made misrepresentations about demand for SolarEdge products in Europe throughout the Class Period.
Following the Court’s decision to sustain nearly all the claims in the case, the parties engaged in discovery, during which Pomerantz also worked towards an early, mediated resolution. After nearly a year of hard-fought discovery and before incurring the significant costs of continued merits litigation, the parties agreed to participate in mediation to explore the possibility of a negotiated resolution. Before attending the mediation, Pomerantz prepared and filed a comprehensive motion for class certification and supporting papers, including an expert report from a highly regarded financial economist.
Ultimately, the parties agreed to a $55 million settlement, which recovered approximately 5-10% of investors’ losses. This was a highly favorable result for the class and avoided the costs and uncertainty of continued litigation.