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PSALM starts one-on-one talks
with prospective buyers of Napocor assets
Philippine Star, 20 October 2003
By: Donnabelle L. Gatdula
The Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. (PSALM) will start one-on-one talks with interested investors for the National Power Corp. (Napocor)'s power generating assets. "We will be conducting one-on-one talks starting Oct. 27 up to middle of November," PSALM vice president Froilan Tampinco said. Results of the talks, Tampinco said, would be used by PSALM to evaluate the new groupings for the generation assets.
Of the 35 companies which have expressed interest to join, 32 have reportedly been able to get the information memorandum. "We are confident that we can consider some of the recommendations that will be arrived at during the talks with investors. We can use them as part of overall strategy in selling and/or coming up with a sale process for the generating assets," Tampinco said. He said the results of the discussions with the prospective bidders will also assist the PSALM in grouping the rest of the assets to be sold. "As you can see, we have only scheduled the first batch of seven assets. We hope that with the consultation, we can group the rest of the assets or schedule all the rest," he said.
According to Tampinco, the talks will also assure the PSALM that the investors will support the new groupings of the generating assets. "We will be able to get their feedback and get their comment on the attractiveness of the assets," he said. He said they would also raise in the talks the issue of the previous proposal to come up with a grouping of "good assets with some not so good assets." "That is the rationale of our legislators. Basically, we aim to adopt the same principle. But this time, we will get the leanings of the investors. This way, we can be assured that the investors will support such kind of groupings and we have some degree of confidence that the investors will support the assets to be sold," the PSALM official explained.
All in all, PSALM will be disposing of some 32 generating assets of Napocor which was originally valued at $2.5 billion. Tampinco admitted that the value of the generating assets will "somewhat" change depending on the new groupings.
"It is currently being done. The value will depend on whether these assets will be sold individually or by group. We have to consider the impact of the new groupings on the value of the assets," he said.
PSALM has decided to proceed with the sale of the generating assets of Napocor while pursuing a negotiated deal with Singapore Power Ltd., the only company that showed interest to buy the transmission assets of the National Transmission Corp. (Transco). Originally, Transco's assets should be privatized first before proceeding with the sale of the generating assets.
The power plants being considered to be sold by this year are: the one-MW Loboc, 4-MW Talomo, 210-MW Navotas 1-3, and 22-MW Bohol power plants. In January next year, PSALM will also start the sale of the 620-MW combined cycle power plant in Limay, Bataan . PSALM has also started preparing for the sale of
600-MW coal-fired Masinloc power plant last August and expected to complete the disposal process by Feb. 2004. PSALM is mandated to handle the privatization of assets of Napocor.
As part of the proposed structure, PSALM also readied the sale of 75-MW Ambuklao and 100-Binga hydro power facilities last July and also expects to complete the sale by Feb. 2004. These two power facilities are part of the Luzon-Angat package/cluster of assets to be sold by PSALM. The other power plants included in the Luzon-Angat package are the 245-MW Angat power plant, 100-MW Pantabangan power plant, and 12-MW Masiway power plant. The 400-MW Sucat diesel-fired power plant is slated to be placed in the auction block by early next year. The preparation for the sale of this plant actually started March this year. Other individual power facilities set to be auctioned off early next year is the 100-MW Pinamucan power plant. It was originally located in Batangas but will be transferred to Dingle, Iloilo . Back to Newsclippings | To top
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