RIVE Private Investment and Mirova, through its fund Mirova-Eurofideme 3, have acquired “Le Douiche” wind farm, a ready-to-build onshore wind project in France from the Nordex Group. The manufacturer will be supplying 20 N117/3000 turbines with a total capacity of 60 MW for the wind farm, split into two project companies. Installation of the turbines is scheduled for this summer with commissioning scheduled for around the end of 2018. The turbines will be serviced by the Nordex Group under a premium service agreement over a period of 20 years. This order was partially booked order intake in Q1/2018 by Nordex.
The project was acquired by RIVE Private Investment, a European private equity company dedicated to renewable energy and defensive private equity investments for family offices and institutional investors, and Mirova, an affiliate of Natixis Investment Managers specialising in responsible investment that manages three funds dedicated to renewable energies with equity of EUR 500 million invested across Europe.
For this operation, Jocelyn Dioux and Jean-Philippe Olivier from RIVE Private Investment leveraged their existing relationship with Nordex and a club deal was organized with Mirova for the acquisition and the negotiation of the debt financing with HSH Nordbank AG.
Jocelyn Dioux, Investment Director at RIVE Private Investment, explains: “This is another important step in our renewable energy strategy as Le Douiche represents our biggest wind park and allows us to reach the symbolic mark of EUR two billion of investments in this asset class. With offices in several European countries, RIVE will keep on growing in renewable energy through its equity and mezzanine funds and in its other private equity investments. We are very happy with this transaction and the partnerships with Nordex, Mirova and HSH, with whom we have been working for many years now”.
Raphael Lance, Head of Energy Transition Funds at Mirova, adds: “We are glad to partner with RIVE and Nordex, and to become majority shareholder of this sizable project in France, where we have been investing in the renewable sector since 2002. This is our third acquisition since the beginning of the year and we will keep investing across Europe in clean energy and storage assets”.
Patxi Landa, Chief Sales Officer of Nordex SE says: “We particularly like these sorts of orders as their complexity challenges many of our skills from project development to equipment engineering as well as long-term turbine service. The market in France holds an exceptional status in this respect”.
The Group has installed wind power capacity of more than 23 GW in over 25 markets, generating sales of almost €3.1 billion in 2017. It currently has roughly 5,000 employees. The production network comprises plants in Germany, Spain, Brazil, the United States and India. The product range primarily concentrates on onshore turbines in the 1.5 – 4.8 MW class addressing the requirements of land constrained as well as grid constrained markets.
Mirova is an affiliate of Natixis Investment Managers dedicated to responsible investment with over EUR nine billion of assets under management. Through a conviction-driven investment approach, Mirova’s goal is to combine value creation over the long term with sustainable development. Mirova’s talents have been pioneers in many areas of sustainable finance. Mirova-Eurofideme 3 is a French professional capital investment fund investing in European renewable energy projects using proven technologies in their construction and operating phases. The fund held its final closing at EUR 353 million in June 2016 and is no longer open for subscription. Mirova has over 15 years of experience in managing renewable energy funds, and has since completed over 70 investments in Europe via the Fideme, Eurofideme 2 and Mirova–Eurofideme 3 funds.
RIVE Private Investment is an independent private equity company founded in 2013 by two investment management firms (123IM and Elyseum Investment). RIVE Private Investment develops flexible, opportunistic and defensive investment solutions specifically for institutional investors and family offices. RIVE Private Investment targets opportunities mainly across Europe and North America, focusing on three defensive sectors, namely infrastructure investments, asset finance and private debt. RIVE Private Investment benefits from the talent and expertise of internal investment professionals based in four European countries. In the renewable energy sector, RIVE Private Investment’s team has financed more than 150 plants, representing close to 1 GW and an asset value of over EUR two billion.
