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Jean-Marie Santander, the founder and former CEO of French wind power developer Theolia, from which he resigned in September, has set up a new company called Global Ecopower, to build, sell and operate wind, solar, hydro and biomass plant. The publicly-listed company, already active in wind power in China, is 43.2% owned by Athanor Equities Sicar, a Luxembourg-based venture capital investment company dedicated to green business. Global Ecopower has bought two fully-authorised projects in China via an assets-for-equity swap in return for shares in Athanor Equities: 800 MW in Jiamusi, in the northeastern Heilongjiang province, and 400 MW in Nanchang, in southeasterly Jiangxi. The company is in discussions with Chinese banks and investors to arrange financing, but all being well, the first 160 MW will come on line in 2010, with the rest following in stages through to the end of 2012. It is also considering raising further capital via a new share issue. In addition to China, Global Ecopower is targeting developing markets in the Middle East and North Africa and is also looking at the US and Canada. Global Ecopower plans to buy consented wind projects, build them and sell around half the capacity to third-party investors in order to finance further construction. It will operate the remaining 50% on its own account and will also operate plant for third parties.