OREANDA-NEWS. May 24, 2011. Toshiba Corporation (TOKYO: 6502) today announced that it has signed a memorandum of understanding with Korea’s Unison Co., Ltd. (018000: KOSDAQ), a wind power equipment manufacturer, on entering the wind power business through a strategic business alliance for the co-development and marketing of wind power generators.

The vehicle for the alliance will be Toshiba's subscription to a 40 billion won (approx. 3 billion yen) convertible bond that Unison will issue after getting appropriate approvals.

Alongside increasing environmental awareness, demand continues to grow for renewable energy sources, including hydro, photovoltaic and geothermal power. The same is true of wind power, which is making progress in Europe and the United States and expected to follow the same trend in emerging economies, most notably China and India. Worldwide wind power generation capacity is expected to almost quadruple in the period from 2008 to 2020[1], from 120GW to 477GW. This fast growth in demand underpins Toshiba's decision to enter the market.

Unison is Korea's longest established wind power equipment manufacturer and has technologies for"direct drive" generators. These are highly durable as they employ a permanent magnet synchronous generator that has no gears. Unison is known for its strength in manufacturing competitive products and for a total annual production capacity equivalent to 1,000MW.

The alliance will give Toshiba rights for distribution of Unison's generators worldwide through its overseas subsidiaries. Toshiba will also work with Unison on co-development of higher efficiency windmills, applying design technologies for fluid mechanics derived from its know-how in steam turbine generators.

Through this collaboration, Toshiba will advance into the wind power business and add to a portfolio of technologies for low-carbon, renewable energy that currently covers hydro, photovoltaic and geothermal power generation.