First Solar Q2'21 Earnings Call

July 29, 2021

| Important Information

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward Looking Statements

This presentation contains forward-looking statements which are made pursuant to safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. All statements in this presentation, other than statements of historical fact, are forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, statements concerning: our business strategy, including anticipated trends and developments in and management plans for our business and the markets in which we operate; our financial guidance for the full-year 2021, future financial results, operating results, net sales, revenues, cost of goods sold, gross margin, gross margin percentage, operating expenses, operating income, earnings per share, net cash balance, capital expenditures, products, product improvements, efficiency, projected costs (including estimated future module collection and recycling costs), warranties, shipments, bookings, booking opportunities, backlog, confirmations, sales, supply, production, nameplate manufacturing capacity, solar module technology and cost reduction roadmaps, product reliability, photovoltaic ("PV") market growth and competitiveness, investments in unconsolidated affiliates, and capital expenditures; our ability to continue to reduce the cost per watt of our solar modules (and the impact of drivers to reduce such costs); our ability to expand manufacturing capacity worldwide; the potential construction of our third Ohio factory and India (Tamil Nadu) factory; our ability to reduce the costs to construct PV solar power systems; research and development ("R&D") programs; the impact of our copper replacement (CuRe) program; energy yield; sales and marketing initiatives; the impact of U.S. tax reform; and competition. These forward-looking statements are often characterized by the use of words such as "estimate," "expect," "anticipate," "project," "plan," "intend," "seek," "believe," "forecast," "foresee," "likely," "may," "should," "goal," "target," "might," "will," "could," "predict," "continue," "contingent" and the negative or plural of these words and other comparable terminology. Forward-looking statements are only predictions based on our current expectations and our projections about future events and therefore speak only as of the date of this presentation. You should not place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. We undertake no obligation to update any of these forward-looking statements for any reason, whether as a result of new information, future developments or otherwise. These forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause our actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements to differ materially from those expressed or implied by these statements. These factors include, but are not limited to: the severity and duration of the COVID-19 pandemic, including its potential impact on the Company's business, results of operations and financial condition; structural imbalances in global supply and demand for PV solar modules; the market for renewable energy, including solar energy; our competitive position and other key competitive factors; reduction, elimination, expiration, or introduction of government subsidies, policies, and support programs for solar energy projects; the impact of public policies, such as tariffs or other trade remedies imposed on solar cells and modules; our ability to execute on our long-term strategic plans; our ability to execute on our solar module technology and cost reduction roadmaps; our ability to improve the wattage of our solar modules; interest rate fluctuations and both our and our customers' ability to secure financing; the creditworthiness of our offtake counterparties and the ability of our offtake counterparties to fulfill their contractual obligations to us; the ability of our customers and counterparties to perform under their contracts with us; the satisfaction of conditions precedent in our sale agreements; our ability to attract new customers and to develop and maintain existing customer and supplier relationships; our ability to successfully develop and complete our systems business projects; our ability to convert existing production facilities to support new product lines, such as Series 6 module manufacturing; general economic and business conditions, including those influenced by U.S., international, and geopolitical events; environmental responsibility, including with respect to cadmium telluride ("CdTe") and other semiconductor materials; claims under our limited warranty obligations; changes in, or the failure to comply with, government regulations and environmental, health, and safety requirements; effects resulting from litigation; future collection and recycling costs for solar modules covered by our module collection and recycling program; our ability to protect our intellectual property; our ability to prevent and/or minimize the impact of cyber-attacks or other breaches of our information systems; our continued investment in R&D; the supply and price of components and raw materials, including CdTe; our ability to attract and retain key executive officers and associates; and the matters discussed under the captions "Risk Factors" and "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations" of our most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K, and our subsequently filed Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, as supplemented by our other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. You should carefully consider the risks and uncertainties described in these reports.

© 2021 Copyright First Solar, Inc.

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| Second Quarter 2021 Highlights

  • Manufacturing
    • Started site preparation for previously announced 3.3 GW factory in Ohio
    • Announced additional 3.3 GW capacity expansion in India; contingent upon permitting and approval of government incentives that are satisfactory to First Solar
    • Factories are expected to produce most competitively advantaged module with an expected lower cost-per-watt and environmental footprint compared to our existing fleet
    • Record year-to-date bookings of 9.0 GW(1); 4.1 GW(2) since previous earnings call
  • Technology
    • New world record CdTe module efficiency validated by manufacturing on commercial production line
    • Recently deployed prototypes of early stage bifacial modules at a test facility
  • Outlook
    • Manufacturing, commercial, and technology momentum, paired with an increasingly favorable policy environment, presents a compelling growth opportunity in the near-to-mid term

© 2021 Copyright First Solar, Inc.

(1)

Data from January 1, 2021 through July 29, 2021

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(2)

Data from April 29, 2021 through July 29, 2021

| Module Segment Update

COVID-19 Update

Performance

Metrics

Supply Chain and

Logistics

Financial

  • Have been permitted and able to maintain manufacturing operations in Malaysia and Vietnam to-date
  • The rise in COVID-19 cases and potential government and other restrictions present ongoing risk to our production, supply chain, and technology implementation plans
  • Delivered strong manufacturing results despite three weeks of downtime for Series 6 Plus implementation in Ohio
  • 91%(1) and 88%(2) fleet-wide capacity utilization; over 100%(1,2) capacity utilization adjusted for downtime
  • 20.4(1) / 19.8(2) MWs produced per day and 97.6%(1) / 97.3%(2) manufacturing yield
  • 448(1) / 449(2) average watts per module and 98%(1) / 98%(2) bin distribution from 440 to 455
  • Sales freight reduced module segment gross margin by 9 percentage points in Q2 of 2021 or 3 percentage points higher year on year
  • Elevated shipping rates highlight the strategic thesis for domestic PV manufacturing
  • For certain new bookings, employing structures that mitigate increases to sales freight costs
  • Have largely hedged glass costs via long term fixed-priced agreements with volumetric pricing benefits
  • Mitigated a portion of aluminum cost challenges through a hedge; lumber impacted Q2'21 results by $2 million
  • Targeting 9% cost per watt produced reduction between Q4'20 and Q4'21
  • Targeting 3% cost per watt sold reduction between Q4'20 and Q4'21

© 2021 Copyright First Solar, Inc.

(1)

Data from June 1, 2021 through June 30, 2021

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(2)

Data from July 1, 2021 through July 27, 2021

| Expected Module Shipments(1) (GWDC):

Systems + Third-Party Module

17.1 GW

11.8 GW

2.0 GW

6.9 GW

(3.6) GW(2)

Dec 31, 2020

YTD Shipments as of

YTD Net-Bookings as

QTD Net-Bookings

Jul 29, 2021(5)

Jun 30, 2021

of Jun 30, 2021(3)

Q3'21(4)

The above table presents the actual module shipments for 2021 through Jun 30, 2021, new module volume net-bookings through Jul 29, 2021, and the expected module shipments beyond Jun 30, 2021. A module is considered to be shipped when the delivery process to a customer commences and the module leaves one of our facilities or the module has been recognized as revenue. Expected module shipments do not have a direct correlation to expected revenues as expected module shipments do not represent total systems revenues and do not consider the timing of when all revenue recognition criteria are met, including timing of module installation.

  1. Expected module shipments includes systems projects and contracted 3rd party module-only sales. Systems projects include (a) under sales agreement, (b) executed PPA not under sales agreement, and (c) no PPA and not under sales agreement, but electricity to be sold on an open contract basis.
  2. 3.6 GW of net shipment volume deducted from backlog; 0.2 GW of modules previously shipped to safe harbor the U.S. investment tax credit for future systems projects.
  3. Reflects net-bookings from Jan 1, 2021 to Jun 30, 2021, reduced by 0.5 GW of debookings.
  4. Reflects net-bookings from Jul 1, 2021 to Jul 29, 2021, reduced by 0.1 GW of debookings.
  5. Balance includes remaining shipment volumes as of Jun 30, 2021 and net-bookings through Jul 29, 2021. Shipments from Jul 1 to Jul 29, 2021 not deducted.

© 2021 Copyright First Solar, Inc.

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First Solar Inc. published this content on 29 July 2021 and is solely responsible for the information contained therein. Distributed by Public, unedited and unaltered, on 29 July 2021 20:28:17 UTC.