Moventas to set up base in Chennai

Finnish company Moventas wants harness India's economic potential by setting up a base in Chennai.

Moventas, one of the largest manufacturers of wind turbine gears in the world, is enthused with India's speedy recovery from the economic crisis and considers it a better market than Europe and America.

'India recovered much faster from the global meltdown than Western countries. They are having difficult times in the installation of wind energy projects,' Valimaki told IANS.

'The location of our company will be at Chennai because most of the windmill customers are based in southern India. Now we are into the process of selecting an Indian as head of sales and customer services. We are expecting that our base will be set up by May or June or before the middle of this year.'

Valimaki said the name of the Indian entity will be Moventas India Private Limited. 'We are expecting a business of three million euros volume in a year from there,' he said.

A Moventas delegation is also coming to India to take part in 'Wind Power India- 2011' exhibition and seminar at Chennai during April 7-9.

According to Moventas officials, around 200,000 windmills are currently operating globally. Around 15 top utility companies represent half of the base of the wind energy market and all of them are in Moventas' portfolio. The remaining half is represented by small businesses, family enterprises and farmers.