SunPower Corp., a Silicon Valley-based subsidiary of Cypress Semiconductor Corp., today announced that its industry-leading, high-performance silicon solar electric cells have been selected by two universities participating in the second Solar Decathlon held in Washington, D.C., October 7-16, 2005.

Reigning Champion in Home Design Contest Switches to SunPower Solar Panels

SUNNYVALE, Calif., October 6, 2005 - SunPower Corp., a Silicon Valley-based subsidiary of Cypress Semiconductor Corp. (NYSE: CY), today announced that its industry-leading, high-performance silicon solar electric cells have been selected by two universities participating in the second Solar Decathlon to be held in Washington, D.C., October 7-16, 2005. The Solar Decathlon is a U.S. Department of Energy-sponsored competition in which teams of college and university students compete to design, build and operate the most attractive, effective and energy-efficient solar-powered home.

The University of Colorado, champion of the first Solar Decathlon in 2002, and the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University both selected SunPower's high efficiency solar cells for two key reasons: superior power performance and sleek aesthetics.

SunPower solar technology generates up to 50 percent more power per square foot than conventional technologies. More power per square foot enables the schools to maximize the power output from the available surface area on the roofs of their homes, reducing system costs per kilowatt-hour. Additionally, SunPower's panels are offered with a uniformly black appearance that is particularly attractive to architects and homeowners.

"After substantial research, the student architects, engineers and business managers at these universities selected SunPower's high efficiency solar panels to power their energy-efficient homes," said SunPower CEO, Tom Werner. "Projects like this demonstrate that solar power can provide a sustainable solution for the country's energy needs while also becoming an attractive part of a home's design."

"We evaluated more than 100 solar panels to optimize our solar power generation and defend our Solar Decathlon championship title," said Jeff Lyng, student project manager for the University of Colorado. "We were pleased to find that the best panels available were also the most beautifully designed to blend into our building."

The Virginia Tech team placed a high priority on architectural design and attractive ways to integrate solar power into a home.

"We were first drawn to SunPower solar panels due to their unique, all-black design," explained Bob Schubert, faculty advisor to the Virginia Tech team. "The opportunity to take advantage of SunPower's solar panels' great aesthetics and high power output will give us an edge in the Solar Decathlon, which considers energy production, consumption and overall building design."

In this year's Solar Decathlon, teams from 18 colleges and universities from the United States, Canada and Spain will compete to see who can build and operate the best designed and most energy-efficient solar-powered home. For two years, the teams worked on the design, research and testing necessary to construct and power these homes. Starting October 7, 2005, the homes will be assembled as a "solar village" on the National Mall in Washington, DC. The public can tour the homes and take away valuable information about where to find solar power resources and how to apply them to existing or future homes. The teams will compete in 10 contests that will judge architecture, livability, comfort and power generation for heating and cooling, water heating, and powering lights and appliances. Each solar house must also power an electric car.

For more information, please visit these websites:
Solar Decathlon http://www.solardecathlon.org.
University of Colorado Solar Decathlon entry http://solar.colorado.edu.
Virginia Tech's Solar Decathlon entry http://vtsolar.arch.vt.edu.
A photo of SunPower's panels on Virginia Tech's home is available at http://vtsolar.arch.vt.edu/progress/2005/09/22/pv_panels_at_the_south_wall/.
For more information about SunPower's solar panels, please visit the SunPower website at http://www.sunpowercorp.com/html/Products/Solar/modules.html.

About SunPower
SunPower—a Silicon Valley-based majority-owned subsidiary of Cypress Semiconductor Corp. (NYSE: CY)—designs and manufactures high efficiency silicon solar cells and modules based on an all-back-contact design. SunPower's solar cells and modules generate up to 50 percent more power per square foot than conventional solar technologies and have a uniquely attractive, all-black appearance. For more information on SunPower or solar technology, please visit the SunPower website at http://www.sunpowercorp.com.

About Cypress
Cypress solutions are at the heart of any system that is built to perform: consumer, computation, data communications, automotive, industrial, and solar power. Leveraging a strong commitment to customer service and performance-based process and manufacturing expertise, Cypress's product portfolio includes a broad selection of wired and wireless USB devices, CMOS image sensors, timing solutions, network search engines, specialty memories, high-bandwidth synchronous and micropower memory products, optical solutions, and reconfigurable mixed-signal arrays. Cypress stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol CY. More information about the company is available online at www.cypress.com.
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SunPower is a registered trademark of SunPower Corp. Cypress and the Cypress logo are registered trademarks of Cypress Semiconductor Corporation. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.