Nordex with double-digit growth in the top and bottom lines

On the basis of preliminary figures, the Nordex Group’s sales increased by 32 percent to EUR 493 million in the first three quar-ters of 2007 (previous year: EUR 373 million), underpinned in particular by strong export demand. As of the balance sheet date, new business was up 60 percent, rising to EUR 823 million (previous year: EUR 515 million), thus ex-ceeding expectations. Firm and conditional orders climbed in value by 148 per-cent to around EUR 1.9 billion (previous year: EUR 763 million). Further projects of EUR 600 million were signed. This order book is sufficient to ensure full capacity utilization until into the second half of 2009. Earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) rose by 93 percent to EUR 23.3 million (previous year: EUR 12.1 million). Accordingly, the return on sales widened from 3.2 percent to 4.7 percent, thanks in particular to the execution of more profitable projects.

In the third quarter, EBIT came to EUR 8 million on sales of EUR 171 million, resulting in a return on sales of 4.7%. This was slightly below management ex-pectations for the third quarter and was primarily caused by the postponement of projects. For the year as a whole, Nordex considers the revenue target of EUR 760 – 770 million and a return on sales of 6% as achievable. This goal is to be achieved by completing the projects postponed in earlier quarters; installa-tion plans for the final quarter assume a business volume of around EUR 270 million.

“We will be devoting all our attention to executing projects in particular during the fourth quarter to complete the contracts postponed in earlier months. As some of the turbines are already in stock, we are confident of being able to reach our full-year targets. However, we can not completely exclude any further postponements today,” says Thomas Richterich, CEO of Nordex AG.

The full interim report on the third quarter will be published on Thursday, November 15, 2007 at www.nordex-online.com.