Northern Power Systems has announced financial results for its fourth quarter and year ended December 31, 2017. Revenues for fiscal year 2017 were $38.6 million, compared to $35.9 million in the prior year.
Gross margin for the year was 19.9 percent, an increase from gross margin of 7.9 percent in the prior year. Net income for fiscal year 2017 was $0.1 million, compared to a $8.9 million loss in 2016. Order backlog at December 31, 2017 was approximately $5 million, compared to backlog of $28 million in the prior year.
Wind turbine sales were driven primarily by strong sales in the Italian market in advance of an expiring Italian feed-in-tariff. As a result of regulatory and political inaction, the Italian feed-in-tariff for distributed wind that drove sales in 2017 expired on June 30, 2017 without extension. Accordingly, the company will be restructuring operations to maintain manufacturing activity consistent with current market conditions. They plan to commence a manufacturing run to satisfy current orders and a limited number of anticipated orders. Following the completion of this batch manufacturing run, the company has decided to temporarily suspend full-scale distributed wind manufacturing activities until the third quarter of 2018 which is in advance of the expected implementation of the new Italian feed-in-tariff in the fourth quarter of 2018.
Wind turbine sales were driven primarily by strong sales in the Italian market in advance of an expiring Italian feed-in-tariff. As a result of regulatory and political inaction, the Italian feed-in-tariff for distributed wind that drove sales in 2017 expired on June 30, 2017 without extension. Accordingly, the company will be restructuring operations to maintain manufacturing activity consistent with current market conditions. They plan to commence a manufacturing run to satisfy current orders and a limited number of anticipated orders. Following the completion of this batch manufacturing run, the company has decided to temporarily suspend full-scale distributed wind manufacturing activities until the third quarter of 2018 which is in advance of the expected implementation of the new Italian feed-in-tariff in the fourth quarter of 2018.