"Dong Energy bid alone with the turbine supplier to be determined at a later stage," the utility told Recharge today, which in theory would leave the field wide open.

But in practice the extremely low price clearly favours OEMs that have a 7MW or, better still, an 8MW turbine on offer.

Even if the price had come in close to €100/MWh GE and Senvion with their respective 6MW and 6.2MW machines would have a very hard time competing, as larger turbines means a lower per-MW cost, analysts had said before the result was known.

Although somewhat speculative at this stage, that would leave only Siemens, MHI Vestas and Adwen in the race.

Siemens yesterday announced it is expanding its offshore portfolio with an upscaled 8MW turbine that will allow for up to 10% higher annual energy production than its 7MW machine.

The timing of the announcement just before Dong announced its win led some in the Dutch market to speculate Siemens to be in the frame for the Borssele job.

The German industrial firm today said it wasn't part of Dong's bid, but that doesn't necessarily mean Dong can't name Siemens as turbine supplier at a later stage.

MHI Vestas – which has its V164 8MW set for first commercial deployment in the UK later this year – declined to comment when approached by Recharge.

It is unlikely that Dong would give the order for such a large contract to a company that doesn't already have a good track record with its large machine – which would only leave Siemens and MHI Vestas in the race.

Adwen, which also has an 8MW machine on offer – and, Recharge understands, a 9MW on the drawing board – today had no comment on a possible order, but said its 8MW turbine will enter serial production in its factories in Germany and France in 2018.

Yet there are serious arguments against Adwen for Borssele. Its 8MW turbine doesn't have a track record yet. Also, the company has won 1.5GW in orders from French offshore wind tenders and Adwen will probably need to focus on producing all the turbines for those in time.

Areva, which owns half of Adwen is in serious financial trouble, making a rapid expansion of output capacity for the 8MW machine unlikely.

To top it all, Adwen is in the middle of a take-over battle after Siemens said it will form a joint venture with Gamesa, which owns the other half Adwen.

If some of these points are resolved soon, Adwen could become a strong contender again, though, believes Simon Luby from K2 Management.

"Provided that Adwen can demonstrate sufficient manufacturing capacity, and demonstrate at an early stage that it is on top of the usual manufacturing ramp-up challenges, then the scale and performance of their machine is sure to make it a key player in future tenders," Luby says.

"They've planned ahead in terms of ability to upgrade that platform even more, which will allow them to compete with MHI Vestas and potentially push Siemens to the side if the latter can't come back with a dedicated new design rather than keep squeezing the current platform."

The Netherlands later this year will hold a second, 680MW tender, for the nearby Borssele 3&4 area.

Note: This article updates an earlier piece on MHI Vestas's position in the bidding with further comment and background