Malaysia’s state-run oil and gas company, Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) has acquired about 100 MW solar assets owned by Acme Solar, said two people aware of the development. The assets located in Karnataka, was acquired at an enterprise value of Rs 800 crore.
Petronas has acquired the assets through its Indian unit- Amplus Energy Solutions.
Last month, the UK-based fund Actis closed its acquisition of 400 MW assets from Acme for an enterprise value of Rs.2500 crore.
With the sale of 100 MW assets, Acme has raised about Rs.3300 crore this year through assets sale.
ET first reported in May on Acme’s proposed deal with Petronas.
Acme, established in 2003 by Manoj Kumar Upadhyay, is one of the largest solar IPPs in India with a diversified portfolio of 5GW spread across multiple states and with a mix of central and state utilities.
Amplus Energy Solutions, leading rooftop solar power producer, was acquired by Petronas last year from New York-based investor I Squared Capital.
Amplus Solar, which provides clean energy to its clients by setting up both on-site solar projects (rooftop and ground-mounted) and off-site solar farms, owns and manages a portfolio of 650 MW of operational and under construction distributed solar assets across India.
Amplus has a portfolio of about 180 commercial and industrial customers including Yamaha, Cisco, Reckitt Benckiser, Shlumberger, Carlsberg, ABB, TVS, and Government entities such as Indian Railways, Delhi Metro, CPWD and HAL.
An Acme spokesperson declined to comment while mail sent to Sanjeev Aggarwal- founder and chief executive officer, Amplus did not elicit any response.
In the last five years, overall renewable capacity in India has doubled from 32GW to 84GW driven by solar and wind. Energy demand is set to increase by 6-7% per annum.
As of 31 March 2020, 35.86% of India’s installed electricity generation capacity is from renewable sources, generating 21.22% of total utility electricity in the country.
India has a target of having 450 GW of renewable energy by 2030.
Meanwhile, India Ratings and Research has revised its Outlook for energy infrastructure companies to Negative from Stable for FY21, as the COVID-19-driven lockdown is likely to affect the liquidity level in all companies across the power sector value chain.
