The fall came despite an 11% increase in revenues to €1211m. At the end of June, the order backlog stood at €4 billion, and the EBIT fell 15% to €78m.

Vestas saw a 22% increase in the number of employees to 21,153 despite the 1142 lay offs in Denmark. In August, a further 425 workers in the UK were made redundant. Vestas says the increase in the number of employees comes from the expanding wind turbine factories in the USA and China.

Vestas says the wind energy market has been hit by the credit crunch, but that many government initiatives are starting to take effect. Vestas therefore maintains its outlook for the full year 2009 of revenues of €7.2bn (up 20%) and an EBIT margin of 11-13%.

Q2 revenue by region (% of total revenue):

• Europe: 79%
• Americas: 11%
• Asia/Pacific: 10%