Areva and Gamesa agree to offshore wind JV

7 July 2014


Seven months after starting negotiations, Gamsea and Areva have signed binding agreements to create a 50/50 joint venture in offshore wind. The deal is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of 2014, subject to various approvals including authorisation from the French government.

Spain-based Gamesa will contribute assets worth €195 million to the new JV, including its 5 MW offshore turbine and its offshore-related engineering, operation and maintenance capabilities.

Areva will put in assets worth an estimated €280 million, including its 5 MW and 8 MW offshore wind platforms, its German manufacturing facilities at Bremerhaven (turbine assembly) and Stade (blades), and its 2.8 GW offshore pipeline.

The JV plans to continue marketing Areva's M5000 turbine as well as commercialising the Gamesa 5.0 MW offshore platform. It will also focus on further developing its 8 MW platform, which is expected to be installed in France from 2021, after Areva's recent success in phase 2 of the French offshore wind tender.

In addition, the JV will be responsible for the creation of a turbine assembly and blades manufacturing plants at Le Havre and the implementation in France of a network of subcontractors and partners, which until now have been led by Areva.

The joint venture will have registered headquarters in Zamudio, Spain, with an executive committee based in Paris. Its board of directors will have eight members, four appointed by each of Gamesa and Areva. Gamesa's business CEO, Xabier Etxeberria will be the chairman of the board and Arnaud Bellanger, current executive vice president of Offshore Wind at Areva will be general manager of the JV company.

20% in Europe by 2020

The new Areva-Gamesa joint venture hopes to become a leading global player in the offshore market, and aims to attain a market share of close to 20% in Europe by 2020, underpinned by projects in Germany, France and UK.

Areva will have an offshore installed base of 630 MW by the end of 2014. It has an additional five projects (1790 MW) in its 5 MW pipeline, including the 400 MW MEG 1 project in Germany where it is supplying 80 M5000 turbines and Iberdrola's 350 MW Wikinger and 500 MW Saint Brieuc projects, for which it has been name preferred supplier.

The JV is also well positioned to take advantage from the great potential of the Asian market, where forecasts indicate an installed capacity of 18 GW within the same time horizon.

In April 2014, Vestas and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries teamed up to establish MHI Vestas Offshore Wind A/S, a similar joint-venture company dedicated to offshore wind turbine business.



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