Ascent Solar Climbing High This Morning (ASTI)

Shares of Ascent Solar Technologies, Inc. ASTI are sharply higher in pre-market trading. The company, which makes solar modules, said in a press release this morning that after completion of environmental testing, some of its modules received IEC 61646 certification. Dr. Farhad Moghadam, President and CEO of Ascent Solar said, "Becoming the first monolithically integrated flexible CIGS module manufacturer to achieve IEC certification is a major industry milestone. We are now looking forward to demonstrating our ability to compete with existing technologies currently being used for large commercial, industrial and residential rooftop applications by adding new beta site installations in addition to those completed with existing and new potential customers that have been waiting for this development. We feel that we have a significant advantage when it comes to power to weight ratios and the real capability our product has to reduce balance of systems costs in turn reducing overall system installed cost to the end customer. Our demonstration of the first flexible CIGS package which meets the IEC testing opens the door to penetration into these large market opportunities.” Shares of ASTI are up 40 cents to $3.80 in pre-market trading.