Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone and thank you for joining us. Today, the company issued a press release announcing its first quarter 2019 financial results. A copy of the press release and associated presentation are available on First Solar's website at investor.firstsolar.com. With me today are Mark Widmar, Chief Executive Officer; and Alex Bradley, Chief Financial Officer. Mark will begin by providing a business and technology update. Alex will then discuss our financial results for the quarter and provide updated guidance for 2019. Following their remarks, we will open the call for questions. Please note this call will include forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from management's current expectations. We encourage you to review the Safe Harbor statements contained in today's press release and presentation for a more complete description. It is now my pleasure to introduce Mark Widmar, Chief Executive Officer. Mark?

Thank you, Adrianna. Good afternoon and thank you for joining us today. I would like to begin by briefly discussing our EPS result for Q1. As we emphasized on our February earnings call, we expected that the combination of lower quarterly Series 6 sales and the higher Series 6 cost per watt relative to the full year average, as well as the timing of both ramp and startup charges, and the timing of project development sales would have the most acute impact to earnings in the first quarter. Our EPS results for the quarter was in part driven by these factors. However, the first quarter was also adversely impacted by some unanticipated non-Series 6 related costs. Alex will go into more detail, but one key area where we have seen significant recent challenges has been containing costs in our EPC business. These challenges include factors both external and internal to First Solar. Externally a higher-than-expected construction labor market and certain equipment supply issues produced a drag on profitability at several of our systems projects. We also encountered certain weather delays for which relief was not available under the EPC contract, which in turn put pressure on required milestones and other completion dates and correspondingly increased costs. From an internal perspective, our recent record of project cost management including subcontractor and vendor cost management failed to meet our expectations. Our EPC capability delivers strategic value to the company, but following a recent evaluation of these issues, we determined that restructuring of the EPC organization was prudent given these issues. Accordingly, we have installed new leadership of the EPC organization, merging our energy systems function with the engineering procurement and construction group. In addition, we are reviewing certain supplier and subcontractor arrangements and potential remedies with a view to addressing certain of…

Thanks Mark. Turning to slide 8, I'll start by covering the income statement highlights for the first quarter. Net sales in Q1 was $532 million a decrease of $159 million compared to the prior quarter. The lower net sales were primarily a result of lower systems projects revenue in the U.S. and Japan partially offset by higher module segment revenue. The percentage of total quarterly net sales of systems revenue in Q1 was 63% as compared to 83% in Q4 of 2018. Gross margin was breakeven in Q1 compared to 14% in the fourth quarter of 2018. The system segment gross margin was 8% in the first quarter and the module segment gross margin was negative 13%. As a reminder, module segment costs of sales comprise of all third-party module cost of sales as well as Series 6 ramp-related costs which as Mark mentioned earlier expected to be felt most acutely during the first half of the year. We experienced ramp-related charges of $36 million in the first quarter approximately 70% of the midpoint forecast for the full year. The system segment gross margin was impacted by $35 million related to the EPC business. This includes approximately $20 million related to our projects with Tampa Electric which were built with our Series 4 products. Challenge with these projects included tight construction schedules, labor shortages, non-force majeure weather-related work stoppages, failure by high-voltage transformer factory acceptance tests, the financial distress of a major subcontractor and certain rework. We've had some higher-than-projected costs and incurred some liquidated damages for failure to meet certain milestones. We had approximately $5 million of impact at our PV project for the inclusion of lower bid in Series 6 modules, a consequence of the earlier-than-expected start of our second Vietnam factory. Products initially produced in January was…

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from Ben Kallo with Baird. Your line is open.

Hey. Thanks for taking my questions. So first, could you guys just talk about on the bookings side I think bookings were down sequentially. But was that just on the EPC side? And can you talk about pricing on the new bookings there to the extent you can how they compare with maybe the last quarter when you talked to us?

Yeah. So Ben if you look at the bookings for the quarter, its 1.1 gigawatts year-to-date bookings, 2.3, right? So and again the 1.1 that we're referencing it's just from the February earnings call. So if you look at it for a two-month period we booked 1.1 gigawatts. For the first two months of the year, we booked 1.3 kind of number 1.2. So they're very comparable. And if you look at the momentum, which we'd say we carried if we carried that forward through the balance of the year, we'll be booking somewhere close to seven gigawatts. So I don't see really any slowdown in the momentum of bookings. I feel it's a robust number to start off the year. As we indicated I think at the start of year it’s positioning us to exceed our targeted 1 to 1 book-to-bill ratio. So that would point us to a number six gigawatts plus trends pointing us to north of that number, which I think is a positive indicator of what's going on and continued momentum in the business. ASPs I continue to be extremely pleased with ASPs. The profile of the bookings, the 1.1 relative to what we booked in the first two months of the year. ASPs are steady. They still have a three-handle type of ASP that we've referenced before. I know there's some indications in the market of pricing being much more aggressive than that. We continue to be able to be patient, given that we're sold out through the end of 2020 and now we're effectively 50% sold for the first quarter of 2021. We can be selective; we can engage with customers, we can make decisions on where to walk away. We're not being held by volume overhang that we haven't already been committed to from a customer, so that helps us tremendously in how we're engaging the market and actually have been very pleased with the corresponding pricing that we're realizing.

Your next question comes from Philip Shen with ROTH Capital Partners. Your line is open.

Hey, guys, thanks for the questions. First is around shipments of Series 6 modules. Can you share how many megawatts you shipped in Q1, and then what that ramp rate might be for Q2? And then secondarily some of our recent checks suggest that you may be focusing some resources on three to five-year cost-out plan and CapEx reduction plan. Is there any truth around this? Are you having people that, for example, have been otherwise focused on near-term capacity ramp-up challenges now switch over to longer-term opportunities? In other words does this highlight potentially that you've solved a lot of your near-term issues and you have an ability to focus on the longer term or medium-term set of problems or cost-outs ahead? Thank you.

So from a shipment standpoint, I think we indicated that we shipped about 900 megawatts for the first quarter. You can take from that that we got two gigawatts of Series 4. Think of it as being that profile being relatively linear. So you get to a position of the shipment profile around 50/50 between the two maybe slightly more Series 4 shipments than Series 6 shipments. The ramp profile is going to increase significantly. The forecast for the year is 5.5. So we got about 4.5 gigawatts now shipped over the remainder of the year. And again that entire ramp is associated with Series 6. The Series 4 profile is going to be consistent across each of the remaining quarters of the year. Phil, I guess for the -- we are very happy we highlighted that on the call around the progress that the team has made for Series 6. And we cannot take our eye off of it though we got to continue to stay focused from both a schedule standpoint, performance standpoint and a cost standpoint. So there's -- we haven't really come up for air yet. We're starting off this quarter very well. April has been a strong month. The first day of May has in fact been a record for us with all of our plants performing extremely well we continue to have to take some amount of planned downtime, which that planned downtime will adversely impact utilization rates. But we'll -- as we currently see it going forward a lot of the major efforts that we need to take planned downtime have effectively happened now through the first four months of the year. There's still efforts that will continue, but a lot of the major lifting has been done so far at least what…

Your next question comes from Jeff Osborne with Cowen & Company. Your line is open.

Hey good afternoon guys. Just one clarification and then two quick questions. Mark I think you've mentioned the pricing of the 2.3 gigawatts in backlog. Is all of that have a "three-handle" as you said? So that includes the one gigawatt for 2021 through 2023 that you announced last quarter?

Yes. We're very happy with the profile of ASPs as they go across that horizon. And yes, we're seeing very good pricing from that standpoint. I think when you look at the Q if I'm not mistaken for what truly was recognized in the -- and they'll come out tomorrow but what's truly been recognized in the first quarter calendar quarter the ASP metric I think will effectively be the same. They'll stay steady. I think it's around $0.36 something in that range right?

Yes. If you do the math you'll see it stay at $0.36. And if you do the comparison to last quarter the incremental is going to show you actually booking at $0.40 per watt now as we know that's rounded for gigawatts and dollars billion. So, going to take that with things yourself but if you look at it today yes you're still going to see the backlog and module in bookings being averaged at $0.36.

Your next question comes from Brian Lee with Goldman Sachs. Your line is open.

Hey guys, thanks for taking the questions. I'll try to get two in here. Maybe first off just given the demand environment and the more stable pricing trends as of late across the industry. Just wondering if you can update us on your thought process around Malaysia one and converting that from Series 4 to 6. And then second question would just be around the new gross margin guidance. Just want to make sure I understand the ins and outs of that. But it implies about $50 million is coming out. Alex you talked about $35 million of EPC and then the incremental $10 million in ramp costs. So, all of the gross margin headwinds relative to the original guidance concentrated here in Q1 results or am I being too cute there? Are there more cost impacts as you move through the year? Thanks guys.

Yes. I'll get the gross margin question. So, yes, you're generally right that you're seeing the impacts in Q1. It's about $35 million related to EPC business and that $10 million of ramp $5 million of which is true increase for the year and $5 million of which is you can think of a move from startup to ramp and you see a corresponding reduction in startup of $5 million. And that gets you -- that bridges you roughly from where we were to the new gross margin percent guidance.

Brian as it relates to the demand environment, again, we continue to be very happy with the demand that we're seeing here in the U.S. but globally as well. We're happy with our pipeline. And one of the things we try to bring into the mix this time was not just the early and mid-stage pipeline -- or excuse me the mid to late-stage pipeline but we brought the kind of the total pipeline in and highlighted that we have about 10 gigawatts of opportunities in different phases that are for 2021 and beyond. So, very encouraged with the team and our ability to continue to engage with customers and find those opportunities. And our hit rates have been very good and I'm happy with that. As it relates to our last -- our first factory and actually [indiscernible] which is currently not committed to our capacity plan our capacity roadmap includes about 6.6 gigawatts of Series 6 which would have two factories in Malaysia two in Vietnam and two in the U.S. We haven't made a commitment yet on that last factory. There's a handful of things that will weigh into our decision-making. One of them is still momentum around Safe Harbor and how long do we run Series 4. So we could potentially even run Series 4 into Q1 of next year because as you know the safe harbor window allows for deliveries that go through April of 2020. So that could be a decision maker that will influence our timing and how we think through a conversion to the extent there's a conversion. The other one that I think is important though is just anything we do will clearly be driven by market. So, as we continue to build our backlog that will give us more confidence. The other one is I somewhat alluded to in what we're trying to do with our second factory in Ohio. One of the things we'd like to do is optimize the footprint to capture as much capacity out of the existing production that we have before we make additional conversions because the CapEx per megawatt of volume is significantly lower by just debottlenecking incremental CapEx and existing capital versus a new brownfield type of conversion and entire equipment set. And then obviously dealing with cost of ramp and everything else that goes along with that. So, there's a lot of moving pieces that will play into our mix in that regard. We'll probably have a much better sense of where we are on that last factory in Malaysia. As we exit the end of this year we'll be probably getting better indication of what our plan will be for that facility.

We have a follow-up question from the line of Jeff Osborne. Your line is open.

Yes. Thank you. I was just going to ask about the TECO challenges. How much of your backlog is in TECO? And are they placated with the resolution that you've had?

So the impact of the last project that we have is like Hancock, we'll be complete here as we exit this quarter. So the items, the portfolio has been largely built now, constructed issued have been countered, obviously reflected in our first quarter. Obviously, we still have some remaining work to be done to complete the last project for Tampa Electric, but we're only a matter of month or two out before that will be completed.

Got it. And then Alex was very specific about Q1 and Q2 and cost of Series 6. Is there any change to that slide that you had multiple quarters as it relates to the second half of the year with the declines relative to the full year average?

Yes. That slide generally holds so and I think there's a question around capacity as well. If you look at that that still holds so the decline in cost for the year going from 130% of the full year average down to minus 10 at the end of the year and then the production being about 75% weighted to the second half of the year in terms of module-only Series 6 sales still holds.

Excellent. That's all I had it. Appreciate you letting me ask more. Thank you.

Your next question comes from Julien Dumoulin-Smith with Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Your line is open.

Hey, good afternoon everyone. Wanted to follow-up a little bit on the backlog question and understand a little bit how it fits with the some of the safe harboring activity. To what extent are -- is some of the incremental hedging and locking in of sales just fulfillment and sort of extension of some of the initial safe harboring activities that you've already committed to in 2019? Or to what extent is this truly novel customers that aren't necessarily trying to lock in 2019 or following in on some of the 2019 safe harbor stuff they've already done? Just want to understand the composition given the pricing discussion we have.

So Julien, there's a good portion of -- and what we said of the 1.1 that was booked 900 of it was in the U.S. and a couple of hundred megawatts would be for projects outside of the U.S. Potentially U.S., but most likely outside so the customer has opportunities both in U.S. and outside. They have an option to determine which projects they want to use that for. They're current -- they currently are envisioning international opportunities, but that could change as well. Given that there's not much volume, there's still some element of this that is somewhat tied to customers' view of around safe harboring. And they may already have -- in some cases the may already have volume that's on our books that enables them to safe harbor. And now they're fulfilling kind of the period in the future, which they need to complete the project. So the 5% may already be in a part of the backlog portfolio that we've already booked in prior year. And now they're saying, hey, well, I need to fill this opportunity out in 2021. And so we're engaging with the conversation for those deliveries. So the way I look at it it's indirectly related to safe harbor, because they're anchoring in with the safe harbor opportunity that's already in the backlog and now they're looking to complete that commitment with volumes that are going to be delivered in 2021. So the pricing isn't necessarily directly related. So it's not that you would say these shipments have to happen now, and therefore you're leveraging that window, which in that window if something is being shipped between now in the safe harbor window ASPs are very strong. And that's one reason why we are looking at potentially how long do we run Series 4, because I think you can get to make economic of hence that make more sense there. And -- but when you go beyond that window, it's largely wasn't the competitive dynamics or alternative options that a customer may have for modules that could be delivered in 2021. And so the window can be more competitive and is more competitive than something that's going to be delivered between now and April of next year. I think there's clear indication in the market that market is tight here in the U.S., especially through our higher efficiency, higher-performing product. There's not as much model or mono-PERC in the marketplace during that horizon, so you're seeing pretty far pricing. Unfortunately, they don't have as much supply that allows us to play that in that window. But when you go beyond that and you're delivering something in 2021 and it's -- our technology stands on its own competitive merits relative to other options our customers may have for deliveries in 2021.

Your next question comes from Colin Rusch with Oppenheimer. Your line is open.

Thanks so much guys. Can you talk a little bit about how far out you're booked at this point and how much capacity you're trying to sell over the next several quarters?

So we are -- what I tried to indicate a little bit is that we're 50% booked now for a targeted capacity in the first quarter of 2021. And so if you look at our capacity roadmap, it would basically tell you it's going to be Series 6 2021 capacity of around 6.6 gigawatts. You can kind of look at the profile of how much would be available in each quarter. We're about 50% booked against that. That's a great position to start the year off. If I look at it across the entire year the numbers are closer to about a third. 30% or so is actually booked at this point in time. And against that we've got -- if you look at our 10 gigawatts of opportunities 2021 both early as well as mid to late stage, we've got a lot of opportunity now that it starts filling in that window in 2021. Now clearly, we have some bookings as we mentioned on our last call that actually go out into 2023. But feel really encouraged by the opportunity set that's in front of us and continuing engagement that we're having with customers. And hopefully, as we progress the only real window, we have a little bit of tail at the end of 2020 to deal with on Series 6. But really, the bookings as we go forward to the balance of this year, and if we achieve our one to one, or greater than one to one, of course somewhere in the range of 6 or 6.5 gigawatts the remaining call it 4 gigawatts will start filling out that 2021 window. Relative to where we are right now, if we can be successful doing that not all that will sit directly in 2021, but we'll be able to fulfill a big portion of that supply requirement by the end of this year if we're successful.

Our final question will come from Travis Miller with MorningStar. Your line is open.

Good afternoon. Thank you. A bit of a higher-level question here, when we look out you talked about some of the policy momentum that certainly we're seeing across the industry more demand from outside of policy. But if you look out kind of two to three years, what do you see in the competitive landscape? Who do you see as competitors? And do you see enough demand out there that perhaps you can fill all capacity and have pricing power in that market?

The – look there's a tremendous amount of momentum. There are numerous catalysts that are driving the global opportunity for PV. The issues – the demand is going to continue to grow isn't any concern. The real question is how much supply comes to the marketplace. That's something, I can't control. If you look at LONGi now I think they're making commitments at the model wafer level, I think going up to 65 gigawatts by 2021, which I think the last numbers that I remember were something closer to 45. Yeah. So those numbers they continue to add capacity. And so it's hard to determine what's going to happen on the spot. What we do though and what our objective is we need to create technology advantage in separation to have the lowest-cost products in the marketplace, and to have the highest energy entitlement that drives to a profit pool opportunity that we are able to capture that our competitors can't. And that's what we continue to do. We've been successful doing that in the past. The challenges in front of us are probably even greater than maybe they have been historically. But that's why we made the decision to shift to Series 6, which gives us the best potential position of strength and to grow this company and to capture scale and drive through and leveraging against our fixed operating cost and manage the business from – continue to manage the business on a balanced business model of growth liquidity profitability. And that's the core tenets of what we try to do, and we're staying the course in that regard. As we look across the horizon, we feel very comfortable, but we know this will continue to be a very challenging and demanding market.

This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.