The PNE WIND Group achieved great progress in the implementation of onshore wind farms at home and abroad in the first nine months of 2016

The PNE WIND Group continued its successful operations on during the first 9 months of 2016. During the period under review, wind farms with a total output of 125.4 MW were either under construction, put into operation or sold. Of this amount, 103.8 MW arose from projects in Germany and 21.6 MW from the first project in France out of the framework agreement with John Laing Investments Ltd.

The first nine months were also successful from a financial perspective. With revenues of euro 77.1 million (previous year: euro 80.5 million) and a total aggregate output of euro 101.9 million (previous year: euro 189.5 million), the Group reported an operating result (EBIT) of euro 7.2 million (previous year: euro 16.7 million) and thereby achieved an improvement of euro 8.6 million over the result as at the end of the first half year 2016. The undiluted earnings per share totalled euro -0.04 (previous year: euro 0.13) and the shareholder equity ratio was 30.4 percent as at September 30, 2016.

The Group's EBIT result was positively impacted by income from the ongoing operation of wind farms. Compared to the previous year, the total aggregate output and earnings are lower owing largely to the sale of the UK activities during the first nine months of 2015. Beyond the core business of developing wind farm projects, the company is increasingly benefiting from its holdings in operational wind farms that generate stable and steady cash flows.

The Wind Farm-Portfolio of internally held projects has increased to 142.5 MW, of which 124.5 MW were operational and 18 MW were under construction. An additional wind farm with a nominal output of approximately 10 MW is currently in the planning permission procedure. The prerequisites for the planned sales transaction have been reached and the Wind Farm-Portfolio should be sold for a three figure million amount directly to an investor by the end of the year. This once again confirms the company's strategy of bringing quality large-scale wind farm projects at regular intervals to the market. Only last year, PNE WIND successfully sold its project pipeline in the UK to the investor Brookfield. The Management Board expects that demand will remain high from institutional investors for such projects at home and abroad in the future.

On the personnel level, PNE WIND was strengthened on September 15, 2016 with Kurt Stürken becoming the Chief Operating Officer (COO). The graduate mechanical engineer has more than twenty years of operational experience in wind energy. The accomplished wind energy expert strengthens the PNE WIND executive board with his national and international project development expertise.

Markus Lesser, CEO of PNE WIND AG comments: “With the first nine months running according to plan, we confirm our objectives for the current year. Provided that the sale of our Wind Farm-Portfolio is completed as planned, we confirm the Group EBIT forecast of in the area of up to euro 100 million this year. Our solid financial basis provides us with sufficient scope to be able to react flexibly to market opportunities and changes. This provides us with a good foundation for the future. We intend to hold up to 25 percent of the Wind Farm-Portfolio and thus continue to benefit from the ongoing operation of the wind farms. We also intend to cover as much of the "wind energy" value chain as possible by expanding our service offering further.