Jan. 22 (Bloomberg) — DCNS SA, a marine engineering
company, will spend as much as 130 million euros ($173 million)
to gain a majority stake in Irish tidal turbine maker OpenHydro
Group Ltd. as the industry moves toward commercialization.
The French company is increasing its holding in OpenHydro,
which makes turbines that use tidal currents to generate
electricity, to 59.7 percent from 11 percent, Chief Executive
Officer Patrick Boissier said today on a conference call.
There are currently no commercial-scale projects in
operation, though Siemens AG and Alstom SA both own stakes in
marine-energy businesses. The shares that Siemens bought to
complete its acquisition of Marine Current Turbines Ltd. last
year implied a valuation for the company of 18 million pounds
($29 million), according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.
“The valuation DCNS is putting on OpenHydro as a result of
this investment is many times the valuation that Siemens put on
MCT when it took over the latter early last year,” said Angus McCrone, senior analyst at London-based researcher BNEF. “The
contrast is intriguing, and suggests differing views on the
near-term potential for the tidal stream energy market.”
DCNS is buying shares from existing shareholders and also
injecting new equity capital into OpenHydro, according to
Boissier. The takeover is subject to regulatory approval and is
expected to be completed in the first half.
France, which wants 23 percent of its energy to come from
clean sources by 2020, plans to install as much as 6,000
megawatts of offshore wind, wave and tidal energy by 2020.
OpenHydro is working with Electricite de France SA to install
projects off the coast of Brittany.
To contact the reporter on this story:
Louise Downing in London at
ldowning4@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Tony Barrett at
tbarrett4@bloomberg.net
