The purchase of a minority stake in Asia Silicon. The company paid $8.1 million to one of Suntech’s existing shareholders to buy a stake in the company. Suntech already has a supply agreement with Asia Silicon to buy up to $1.5 billion worth of high-grade polysilicon from Asia Silicon over the next years.

Zhengrong Shi, Suntech’s chairman and CEO, commented on the deal:

“We are very pleased to cement our relationship with Asia Silicon. Asia Silicon has all the makings of a world-class polysilicon producer, due to the utilization of the most advanced production equipment, their expert technical team, and industry leading cost structure. By combining Asia Silicon’s low-cost polysilicon with Suntech’s high conversion efficiency technology, we believe that we will be able to achieve grid parity in many parts of the world within the next two or three years.”