Wind turbine materials manufacturer and wind farm developer Swancor Holding Co Ltd (上緯) yesterday said it is in talks with two foreign offshore wind turbine providers, Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy and MHI Vestas Offshore Wind AS, to supply turbine blade resins.
Swancore is expected to benefit from the government’s ongoing push to adopt wind power as the Ministry of Economic Affairs encourages overseas wind farm operators and turbine manufacturers to collaborate with suitable Taiwanese suppliers with the aim of building a local supply chain for related manufacturing and maintenance capabilities.
The ministry last month announced that seven offshore wind farm developers have secured government contracts to build 10 offshore wind farms along the western coast of Taiwan.
Blade resin is included in the government’s “localization” plan, Swancor chairman and president Robert Tsai (蔡朝陽) told an investors’ conference in Taipei.
“We are working to obtain certifications [from Siemens Gamesa and MHI Vestas],” Tsai said. “Swancor should be able to meet their requirements.”
Apart from the domestic market, Swancor also provided a positive outlook on its resin business overseas this year, as the Nantou County-based company expects to recoup some orders from Goldwind Science and Technology Co (金風科技), the largest wind turbine maker in China.
In 2015, Swancor was a major resin supplier to Goldwind, supplying 58 percent of the turbine resin consumed by the Chinese firm, but its share plunged to less than 20 percent in 2016 and last year.
Swancor last year failed to pass the Chinese firm’s certification test.
Swancor aims to secure nearly 22 percent of Goldwind’s resin orders this year, Tsai told investors.
The firm said it last quarter began shipping resins to another major Chinese wind turbine manufacturer and expects to secure a 20 percent allotment of that company’s resin orders this year.
Swancor last quarter reported losses of NT$42 million (US$1.4 million), compared with a net profit of NT$1 million in the same same period last year.
However, revenue last quarter rose 23 percent from NT$937 million a year earlier to NT$1.15 billion.
Net losses per share were NT$0.47 in the January-to-March period, with gross margin falling from 18.6 percent a year earlier to 12.6 percent, company data showed.
The company partly attributed the decline of its bottom line to soaring prices of epoxy, a key material that accounts for about 70 percent of wind blade resin’s material costs.
Swancor said profitability should improve this quarter, as it has raised product prices to better reflect an uptrend in material costs.
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