Panasonic Corporation confirms Wednesday morning it "will begin to wind down U.S. production of photovoltaic cells and modules at Gigafactory New York in Buffalo" by the end of May.

"Panasonic is supporting Tesla in its efforts to identify and hire qualified applicants from Panasonic’s impacted workforce. Tesla plans to hire qualified applicants to new positions needed to support its solar and energy manufacturing operations in Buffalo," the company says. See the full statement below.

This confirms information what sources told Spectrum News’ Ryan Whalen Tuesday night. 

Empire State Development Chair Howard Zemsky said Panasonic has made a corporate decision to move away from global solar products.

A source says Panasonic will exit the solar market in September of this year.

It was not immediately clear how many employees will be affected. As of January 2019, there were 400 Panasonic employees at the Riverbend facility. 

A city spokesperson tells Spectrum News that Mayor Byron Brown is scheduled to meet with Panasonic leadership Wednesday and will have an announcement to make after.

While Panasonic is pulling out of RiverBend, Telsa appears to be adding headcount.

Zemsky says Tesla informed the state it has not only met a benchmark of adding 1,500 jobs to the RiverBend facility, it's exceeded that mark.

Telsa had until the end of April to reach the job commitment goal or pay the state a more than $40 million penalty.

A source tells Spectrum News that Telsa plans to ramp up production of its solar roofing product with plans to manufacture 1,000 solar roofs per week.

Tesla also plans to hire as many ex-Panasonic employees as possible who are qualified for positions at Tesla's Gigafactory.

The full statement from Panasonic is below.