SHENYANG, China, Sep. 16, 2009 (PRNewswire-Asia-FirstCall) -- A-Power Energy Generation Systems Ltd. (Nasdaq: APWR) ("A-Power" or "the Company"), a leading provider of distributed power generation ("DG") systems in China and a fast-growing manufacturer of wind turbines, today announced that the Company has signed a definitive contract to acquire 100% of EVATECH Co., Ltd. ("EVATECH") of Kyoto, Japan, a 22-year-old designer and manufacturer of industrial equipment for LCDs (liquid crystal displays), PDPs (plasma display panels) and, more recently, amorphous-silicon (a-Si) photovoltaic (PV) panels. The total consideration is $49.9 million in cash. The transaction is expected to close by the end of November 2009.
A-Power is to fund 55% of the transaction from the Company's internal financial resources. The balance, or 45%, will come from foreign-investment grants from various levels of the local government (20% from the Liaoning Provincial Government, 20% from the Shenyang Municipal Government, and the remaining 5% from the Hunan New District Government in Shenyang).
"The EVATECH acquisition is an essential part of A-Power's strategic vision to be an all-around, diversified cleantech solution provider in China," said Mr. Jinxiang Lu, Chairman and CEO of A-Power. "Growing out of our core DG business, we are establishing a foothold and gaining traction in various areas such as wind, and now solar. It is important to understand that all of these cleantech forms receive strong, committed support from the Chinese government. In terms of solar, we plan to use EVATECH's low-cost and high-efficiency a-Si thin-film technology to produce PV curtain glass walls and take advantage of China's RMB 20 per watt subsidy for the building-integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) projects. As part of the plan, we expect to move EVATECH's manufacturing facility to Shenyang by the end of the year and start production and co- marketing of our PV products with a local construction group for Chinese customers sometime next year. We expect EVATECH to begin revenue contribution in late 2010."
Based in Kyoto, EVATECH currently has 85 employees and has branch offices in Tokyo, Shanghai and Taiwan. Its main manufacturing facility and its thin-film photovoltaic R&D center are located in Kyoto.
