Meet
Martin Graa Jennum
Mar 10, 2022
Head of Corporate Finance Read more
“At European Energy, all ideas are always met with an open mind”
Who I am
I am a 37-year-old Dane with a master’s degree in Economics and Business Administration (can.merc.fir.) from Copenhagen Business School.
What I do at European Energy
At European Energy I am working with financing and divestment of projects. Furthermore, I spend a lot of time working on the company’s funding opportunities, both through various strategic partnerships and our listed bond. I have a broad background and before coming to the renewable industry, I worked in the banking sector, where my role among many things were to work with M/A related activities.
A typical day at European Energy
Part of my job at European Energy is to identify sales opportunities and to negotiate on various cases. I do everything in the thus required process – from analysing business opportunities (both acquisition and divestments), meeting with investors and bankers, travelling to meet business partners, visiting construction sites, as well as going into detailed processes on valuating, calculating and contract negotiations etc. Other than that, I spend a lot of time controlling the projects that I am responsible for
A categorization of the way I work
My working style is characterized by being very adaptable and process oriented. I always seek and insist on learning something new in every process – both personally and professionally. Otherwise, I quickly get bored. That is why I particularly like working in a sector, where the core task is to combine many facets; such as commercial economics, technical engineering skills and legal assessments in every decision process.
What motivated me to work at European Energy
I came from the financial sector (Finansiel Stabilitet A/S), where I worked with take over of banks, selling of banks and loan portfolios. I was seeking to be part of a sector that was driven by a bigger purpose, whereby I started looking at the renewable sector. European Energy seemed like a fun and international place to work, with at mentality of a start-up company. Furthermore, I wanted to be part of something more tangible, and I have always been very technically interested, why the renewable atmosphere could be an inspiring place to be among engineers and other technical experts. Therefore, I found the job at European Energy a good match between my personal interests and prior experiences.
The best things about European Energy
All ideas are always met with an open mind and all challenging cases are always solved in a professional manner. It is great to work with such diverse colleagues from different educations, cultures and international environments. Finally, it is very satisfying to work within an important socioeconomic field combined with working in a growth business. European Energy was a rather unknown company when I began in 2015 and today, it is among the most important renewable developers in Europe – I find that very exciting!
My biggest achievement
Never good with these kinds of questions. Nonetheless, I would like to point out that it is really inspiring to work with various projects around the world. I have strangely enough never worked with any Danish transaction during my employment. I never thought, before joining the company, that a rather small company could work with such a success in so many international markets, and I find it easy to adapt to this.
Personally – I would have to say my kids. Luckily, I find that there is a great work-life-balance at European Energy. As long as you perform, there is a lot of freedom under responsibility.