April 24 (SeeNews) - Austrian hydro power firm Verbund said on Wednesday it has signed over its 50% stake in Turkish energy provider Enerjisa Enerji, jointly owned with Turkey's Haci Omer Sabanci Holding [BIST:SAHOL], to German utility E.ON as part of an asset swap deal.
In return, Verbund acquired the shares of E.ON in eight run-of-river hydro power plants on the rivers of Inn and Danube in Germany, becoming the sole owner of the plants and doubling its average annual hydro power generation in Germany to some 4.0 billion kilowatt-hours, the company said in a statement.
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Verbund added it will receive a difference payment of some 400 million euro ($520 million) as part of the deal.
"By finalizing the acquisition of a stake in an established and successful power company with nearly 2.0 gigawatts [GW] already in operation, we’ve given E.ON a significant market position in Turkey, which is one of our target growth markets," E.ON CEO Johannes Teyssen said in a separate statement on Wednesday.
Enerjisa was the winning bidder in recent auctions for the privatisation of power utilities Istanbul Anadolu Yakasi Elektrik Dagitim and Toroslar Elektrik Dagitim. Upon finalizing the privatisation process, Enerjisa's distribution companies will have a customer base of 9.0 million.
Enerjisa plans to have operating power generation capacity of 7.5 GW by 2020, E.ON said in its statement.
($ = 0.770 euro)