"Statkraft wishes and needs to recruit new employees in Sweden who can work with us to provide the Nordic region with pure energy in the coming year, remarked Per Nordlund, Managing Director of Statkraft Sweden.” 

In 2005 Statkraft acquired 19 hydropower plants from Graninge, the company which later changed its name to E.ON Sweden. Statkraft also set up a new operating centre in Sollefteå to run those 19 facilities. Along with the trading division in Stockholm, the Swedish hydropower plants have been important in providing Statkraft with a strong foothold in the Nordic energy market. Now, with this letter of intent with the German company E.ON AG to acquire 36 hydropower plants from E.ON Sweden, Statkraft is set to become the fourth-largest hydropower producer in Sweden.
Although the broader details of the letter of intent are relatively clear, it is still only a letter of intent. Nordlund stressed that a number of formal matters need to be clarified before a final agreement can be signed in the spring of 2008. This means that some questions will have to remain unanswered for a while longer, such as those related to the workforce situation.

Challenging
The formal takeover of the facilities will probably occur in the autumn of 2008. In the meantime, Statkraft will put its organisation into place, as well as clarify location and workforce issues within a year.
“It will be exciting and I’m sure quite hectic. With the Graninge acquisition, Statkraft gained valuable experience in this kind of process, even though there are certainly some important differences between that case and the one we are dealing with now – such as size,” explained Nordlund. “In the immediate future, a variety of solutions will be evaluated, but it is already apparent that we will need people to staff an expanded operating centre, in both administrative and operational positions. We will also have to decide where to set up technical and administrative offices.”

Welcoming people
So will there be a need to recruit new staff in Sweden?
“Absolutely. Our core business is operating power plants that generate environment-friendly energy. The most crucial component in this work is suitably qualified people. However, unfortunately we cannot say much more about that at this point, as a lot of matters are still to be resolved. We will deal address these issues in negotiations on the various facilities with E.ON. It would be wrong to disclose any information at this stage,” remarked Nordlund, “but we can state that Statkraft wishes and needs to recruit new employees in Sweden who can work with us to provide the Nordic region with pure energy in the coming year.”