Mercom Reports Strong Corporate and Project M&A Activity in Wind Sector

Mercom Capital Group has released its report on funding and merger and acquisition (M&A) activity for the wind sector in 2015.

According to the clean-tech research and consulting company, total global corporate funding in the wind sector, including venture capital/private equity (VC), debt financing and public market financing, raised by public companies reached $15.4 billion, compared to $11.8 billion in 2014. Global VC investments rose to $520 million in 14 deals in 2015, compared to $311 million in 15 deals in 2014.

Public market financing in the wind sector was down in 2015 with $2.8 billion in 20 deals, compared to 16 deals for $3.7 billion in 2014. There were three IPOs in 2015, including two yieldcos, raising a total of $1.3 billion. Announced debt financing in 2015 increased by more than 56 percent bringing in $12 billion in 40 deals, compared to 2014 with $7.7 billion in 23 deals, Mercom reported.

Announced large-scale project funding deals in 2015 totaled $18.3 billion in 101 deals compared to $19.9 billion in 120 deals in 2014. A total of 113 investors participated in these deals. Top investors continued to be development banks including KfW IPEX-Bank, which funded 14 projects, Brazilian Development Bank with nine, Santander with seven and Overseas Private Investment Corporation, which funded five projects, the report shows.

Wind corporate M&A activity in 2015 accounted for 48 transactions of which only 30 disclosed transaction amounts. In comparison, there were 28 transactions (12 disclosed) in 2014.

There were 154 wind project acquisitions in 2015 for nearly 30 GW compared to 2014 also with 154 transactions, for about 25 GW of wind projects. Investment funds once again led project acquisitions with 9 GW in 2015, followed by project developers with 8 GW, utilities with 7 GW and yieldcos with 5 GW of wind project acquisitions. Of the 154 project acquisitions this year, 140 involved onshore wind projects compared to 136 that exchanged hands in 2014, the company said.

Mercom also tracked 48.8 GW of announced large-scale onshore and offshore projects in 2015 in various stages of development globally that could be potential candidates for financing and M&A.