Superior Product Surmounts Economic Crisis
The wind turbine giant NEG Micon emerges from crisis a better and healthier company
In the late 1990s, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of wind turbines, NEG Micon, underwent very vigorous growth and expansion, so the wind turbine industry held its breath when, in the autumn of 1999, NEG Micon experienced a crisis that meant the company lost 90 per cent of its market value. Was this the beginning of the end of the biggest Danish industrial adventure of the last century, which had propelled Denmark into a unique first place in the race to develop renewable energy for the insatiable needs of the future?
In a matter of weeks, however, a rescue plan had been implemented, and wind turbine blades of NEG Micon began turning once again.
“In reality, NEG Micon’s difficulties in 1999, and the company’s reconstruction and rebirth, showed more clearly than any number of sales brochure could just how superior Danish technology is when it comes to wind energy,” says Torben Bjerre-Madsen, managing director of NEG Micon. “The crisis revealed a number of problems stemming from too vigorous growth that resulted in losing sight of the big picture on the one hand and, on the other, a few technical problems, which it was possible to solve through focused efforts. Basically, the product, the actual wind turbine, was among the best in the world, and the need for competitive, renewable energy is increasing tremendously. Today, NEG Micon is well on the way to achieving the same position among the world’s manufacturers of wind turbines as it occupied before the crisis.”
The cure for the continuation of NEG Micon was the injection of new capital as well as a strong focus on core company competencies. “First and foremost, this is a The wind turbine giant NEG Micon emerges from crisis a better and healthier company matter of an industry experiencing constant growth and that appeals to professional investors, of course,” says Bjerre-Madsen. “Secondly, the company had an excellent product and a good foundation on which to continue building. The very fact of 10,000 successfully operating wind turbines all over the world churning out cheap, renewable energy into the power grid is a tough frame of reference to dismiss. In the end, we underwent some severe internal restructuring, where we defined the sequence of technologies we wished to invest in. NEG Micon has in fact emerged from the crisis a better and healthier company.”
Torben Bjerre-Madsen, managing director of NEG Micon.
The pivotal point for NEG Micon’s business concept today is to create added value for the customers in all phases of the wind turbine project in hand.
“The prerequisite for the development of any society is a stable and adequate supply of electricity that at the same time takes account of a number of challenges affecting the global environment,” says Bjerre-Madsen. “The days when wind energy was carried along by the enthusiasm of happy-go-lucky amateurs are long gone,” says Bjerre-Madsen. “Of course, a wind turbine is still considered to be a green product, and that implies a number of obligations, but otherwise, the price is the decisive factor today. It’s a question of producing the cheapest energy possible whilst it is renewable. For that reason, we are concentrating on optimising every element of the total solution. The size of turbine that a few years ago had an output of 500 kW, today has an output of almost double that. Every day, wind energy is getting cheaper and cheaper to produce. Just when the trend will hit the high point, know one really knows as yet. The possibilities are untold.”
www.neg-micon.dk
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