The two companies joined forces to start the integration, marketing and distribution of Ascent Solar's CIGS modules in India.
Ascent Solar Technologies is a developer of flexible thin-film solar modules. The company announced a new strategic alliance agreement with Indian company Kirloskar Integrated Technologies Limited, part of the industrial and engineering conglomerate Kirloskar Group.
According to Ascent Solar the product is targeted for markets like defense, consumer portable power, off grid rural power solutions and hybrid solar and diesel generation back up power systems.
The second phase of the agreement will imply the construction of a complete backend module assembly plant in India. The final phase of the contract will be expansion of India production to include complete end to end PV module manufacturing.
The companies collaborated before under a memorandum of understanding signed in 2009. The new alliance comes as the outcome of the previous collaboration.
L.A. Joshi, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Kirloskar, said: "Kirloskars's vision is to provide decentralized sustainable solutions based on renewable resources. Having successfully established energy solutions using technologies like anaerobic digestion of organic waste and non-edible vegetable oil and biodiesel, we were in search of an appropriate partner for solar photovoltaics, which can compliment Kirloskar's strength as a leader in distributed power generation."
Joshi added that he is pleased to have Ascent as a partner in the effort to harness the large solar energy potential related to off-grid and on-grid applications, while taking advantage of the favorable policies of the Indian government.
Farhad Moghadam, Ascent Solar’s President and CEO stated: "Our relationship with Kirloskar provides Ascent Solar with a partner for development of multiple market opportunities in a rapidly advancing country like India. We believe that Kirloskar has significant relationships and well established sales and marketing channels in key target markets for defense, space, consumer electronics and hybrid diesel generators. We are proud to continue our work with Kirloskar to address a wide array of growing off-grid and on-grid PV opportunities in the growing Indian market."
