Full Description

First Solar, Inc., incorporated on February 22, 2006, designs and manufactures solar modules using a thin film semiconductor technology. The Company’s solar modules employ a thin layer of cadmium telluride semiconductor material to convert sunlight into electricity. Each solar module is approximately 2 feet by 4 feet (60 centimeters by 120 centimeters) and had an average rated power of approximately 73 watts, during the fiscal year ended December 27, 2008. Its solar module is a single-junction polycrystalline thin film structure that uses cadmium telluride as the absorption layer and cadmium sulfide as the window layer. The Company’s solar power systems and project development business provides a variety of integrated services to its customers as part of a system solution delivery. These services include solar power system design, procurement of permits and balance of system components, construction management, monitoring and maintenance.

The Company has long-term solar module supply contracts (the Long Term Supply Contracts) with one United States and 15 European project developers, system integrators and operators. The Company’s customers develop, own and operate solar power plants or sell turnkey solar power plants to end users that include owners of land, owners of agricultural buildings, owners of commercial warehouses, offices and industrial buildings, public agencies, municipal government authorities, utility companies and financial investors that desire to own large scale solar power plant projects.

The Company has participated, or is participating, in laboratory and field tests with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, the Arizona State University Photovoltaic Testing Laboratory, the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy, TUV Immissionsschutz und Energiesysteme GmbH, and the Institute fur Solar Energieversorgungstechnik. As of December 27, 2008, it had approximately 10,000 solar modules installed worldwide at test sites designed to collect data for field performance validation. Using data logging equipment, the Company also monitors more than one million solar modules, representing approximately 69 megawatts of installed photovoltaic systems, in use by end users that have purchased systems using its solar modules.