There have been a spate of alt e companies lately, announcing what I would call "growing pains". Basically, the investment curves are not up to speed with the projected expansion plans and/or there are some general unanticipated delays occurring downstream, eating into profitability. Well, as the likes of Renewable Energy Corporation have discovered, it's not going down too well in the marketplace, which has been very jittery of late.

Latest in the list is Nordex AG, a leading developer and manufacturer of wind turbines. According to this report in Reuters;

"the CEO said he still expected Nordex to grow at a rate of 50 percent this year. Nordex, which failed to meet its own targets last year due to project delays, is aiming to reach sales of 1 billion euros ($1.45 billion) in 2008 and expects profitability to improve. By 2011, Nordex plans for sales to reach up to 4 billion euros and for the operating margin to rise to up to 12 percent".

On the face of it, how could a 50% growth in sales in 2008 and a quadrupling in those sales by 2011, with higher margins, be bad news?

Well, no one seems that impressed - as you'll see from the 1 year chart, the stock has dropped off considerably from just under 40 euros per share in early November, to just over 25 today, although it has not moved greatly in the last week.

It does seem that investors are taking for granted the exceptional growth rates of the alternative energy companies or they simply see them as fairly priced. Similarly, maybe management should have a bias in setting targets that they are more likely to outperform rather than fail to meet.

Still, how many other sectors are projecting sales growth like this?