GEA increases activities in the solar-thermal business

GEA Ibérica, the Spanish subsidiary of the GEA Group AG (Bochum, Germany; www.geagroup.com), has acquired Caldemón Ibérica S.A., a leading manufacturer of shell-and-tube heat exchangers and surface condensers, commonly used in solar thermal power plants. In 2008, the company expects sales of more than EUR 10 million with a total of 90 employees. The activities of Caldemón Ibérica will continue at the existing site in Revilla de Camargo, near Santander, Spain, but, due to the brand strategy of the GEA Group, the company will be renamed to GEA Caldemón S.A. Including Caldemón the GEA Group has acquired 10 companies in the financial year 2008 (the previous acquisition being ADG Packaging Systems Limited in November), all of which have a combined sales volume of approximately EUR 200 million. “We have a fast and sustainable growing market in the solar thermal business, and, as is predicted in the IEA World Energy Outlook 2008, the installed capacity of solar thermal power plants will increase from 7 GW to 35 GW on a global scale by the year 2015,” says Juerg Oleas, chairman of the GEA Group. This growth prediction is based on the global need to save energy resources and simultaneously…