MONEY FLOWING TO WIND

Wind Sector Project Funding Activity Robust in Q1 2013…VC funding shows signs of life with $16 million

April 2013 (Mercom Capital Group)

“…Wind venture capital funding rebounded in the first quarter of 2013, raising $16 million in three deals after the previous quarter saw just one $500,000 VC deal…VC deals included Export Development Canada’s $7 million financing of Endurance, a Vancouver-based manufacturer of wind turbines designed for power grid applications. Also receiving financing was Pentalum, a developer of a wind LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) system for remote sensing of wind, which raised $5.5 million from Bright Capital, Cedar Fund, Evergreen Venture Partners, ABB and Draper Fisher Jurvetson…

“Most of the funding activity this quarter went towards project funding. Announced project funding in Q1 2013 came to $6.2 billion in 29 deals…Large-scale onshore wind projects received over $3.42 billion in 26 deals while offshore wind projects received over $2.74 billion in three deals…[The biggest project funding was] $1.9 billion in project financing for wpd group’s 288 MW Butendiek offshore wind project in Germany…”

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“There were four M&A transactions in Q1 2013, amounting to $543 million, out of which three were disclosed…The top M&A transaction this quarter was the acquisition of the Polish onshore wind business of Dong Energy, a company involved in procuring, producing, distributing and trading in energy and related products, by two Polish power utilities Polska Grupa Energetyczna (PGE) and Energa, for $314 million.

“There was strong project acquisition activity this quarter with 17 transactions amounting to $1.4 billion. The largest project M&A transaction by amount was UK-based renewable energy investor and developer Blue Energy’s acquisition of the 177 MW RidgeWind portfolio from HgCapital for $392 million. The largest project acquisition by MW was Geronimo Energy’s acquisition of Midwest Wind Energy’s 1,000 MW Wind Park Burg II Project…”

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