German investment company set to go public

German company WPD, the largest operator of structured funds for investment in wind projects (Windpower Monthly, September 2001), is to become a public limited company. The Bremen-based firm, which has organised financing for 143 turbines totalling 160 MW, has set up a stock holding company for all its business activities. These include WPD Vertrieb, its division for commercial financing and marketing of wind stations, WPD International, WPD offshore, and the company's renewable energy division, WPF Erneuerbare Energien. Its stock capital has been registered at EUR 10 million with board members Gernot Blanke and Klaus Meier each holding 48.75%, with the rest owned by an unnamed silent partner. There are no plans for the company to go public. WPD Vertrieb last year raised DEM 58.8 million from the private investment market for equity stakes in DEM 180 million of wind power projects, the largest amount raised of any wind fund marketer, according to WPD's Christoph Gawin. This year it expects to raise enough equity to finance DEM 350 million of projects. "Expansion at home, offshore and in the international markets means we are pre-financing projects on an ever bigger scale," says Blanke.