Dark Victory.

CRISES ALWAYS PROVIDE GOOD BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES FOR BOLD ENTREPRENEURS.

And these days in Brazil, it's not just candle manufacturers and oil-lamp dealers that are making big bucks courtesy of the power shortage. Generators are selling like hot cakes.

Marco Antonio Vieira is one of those entrepreneurs whose Rio de Janeiro company is benefiting from energy rationing. Vieira, 49, and a partner launched their small company, Newmar, five years ago. The operation determines a company's energy needs, installs gas-powered generators then takes care of maintenance.

"It's getting hard to find any time to sleep," says the naval engineer, who has been working around the clock in recent months.

Newmar installs generators at hotels, shopping centers and small and medium-sized businesses. Its staff is small--only 116 employees--but its strength comes from a coveted data bank it compiled of 2,500 companies with critical energy needs. As in the case of Marriott's imposing Renaissance hotel in Sao Paulo, many of those companies are becoming customers.

The five-star luxury hotel recently invested about US$1 million to install a generator. Once word got out that the Renaissance had its own light source, corporations started targeting the hotel for their meetings. Events bookings have jumped 30% since the energy scare, says Paulo Henrique Alves, Renaissance's operations director.