Oct. 23--SunPower, the San Jose solar-panel maker, said Thursday that third-quarter sales grew 23 percent from a year ago, but it reported a big drop in profit over the same period.

The company also cut its projections for its results for the full year, helping to send its shares down more than 10 percent in after-hours trading.

For the quarter, the company reported revenue of $466 million, compared with $378 million in the same quarter a year ago and well up from the $298 million it reported in the second quarter.

But profit dropped 48 percent: $12.8 million, or 13 cents a share, in the most recent quarter compared with $24.7 million, or 29 cents a share, a year ago. The company missed the estimates of analysts, who expected it to earn 20 cents, according to Bloomberg News.

And it trimmed its 2009 sales estimate to between $1.425 billion and $1.5 billion, compared with an earlier forecast of $1.35 billion to $1.7 billion.

"Between Q1 and Q3, revenue more than doubled," said Pavel Molchanov, an analyst with Raymond James. "It was a decent quarter, but gross margins were under pressure," he said, referring to the drop in profit.

SunPower sank $3.80, or 11.4 percent, to $29.50 in late trading on the Nasdaq stock exchange. Before the earnings announcement, the company had declined 10 percent this year.

SunPower, which has 5,360 employees, manufactures photovoltaic solar modules that turn sunlight into electricity. It serves residential, commercial and utility consumers.

CEO Tom Werner said the quarter's results are due in part to the growth of SunPower's dealer network. SunPower added about 300 dealers in new markets such as France, South Korea and Canada and now has 900 dealers, mostly in the United States and southern Europe.

"The rapid expansion of our dealer network shows this is a scalable business," Werner said. "We can quickly enter new markets and establish our presence."

Akeena Solar of Los Gatos, which focuses on the residential market, also reported third-quarter earnings Thursday. It lost $2.4 million, or 7 cents a share, on sales of $7.7 million. That compares with a loss of $5.5 million, or 19 cents a share, on sales of $10.6 million for the same quarter a year ago.

The decline in revenues was largely due to the collapse of commercial sales.

"Commercial really just died, and residential just plugged along," said Akeena CEO Barry Cinnamon.

Bloomberg News contributed to this report.

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