May 10 (SeeNews) - Romanian power supplier and distributor Electrica [BSE:EL] has placed an offer to purchase assets of Czech power utility CEZ in Bulgaria, Romanian energy minister Toma Petcu has said.
"Electrica has submitted an offer to take over the shares which CEZ has in Bulgaria. This is the company that supplies energy to Sofia and its surroundings, so we have 3 million customers, a fairly large portfolio," Petcu said on Tuesday in a video interview for local news portal DCnews.ro, which was live streamed on Facebook.
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"We would very much like to be able to acquire this package of shares and become a regional player," Petcu added.
Further details were not immediately available.
CEZ Group announced in January it had decided to study options related to its equity investments in Bulgaria based on the interest of several investors.
In Bulgaria, CEZ operates a power distribution company, a retail electricity supplier and a wholesale trader. CEZ also owns a coal power plant with an installed capacity of 1,265 MW near the city of Varna as well as two renewable sources plants.
In February, Bulgarian media reported that CEZ was considering withdrawing from the country's market and that companies from Romania, France and Turkey were interested in taking over the company assets in Bulgaria.
With approximately 10,000 employees, Electrica is providing services to over 1.6 million customers and is operating at national level organized in three zones for electric power distribution:Transilvania Nord,Transilvania Sud, Muntenia Nord, and all over the country for electric power supply, maintenance and energy services.
Electrica's consolidated net profit dropped 20% to 239.2 million lei ($56.5 million/53.1 million euro) last year, while revenues fell 5.5% on the year to 362 million lei.
Blue-chip company Electrica, in which the state owns a stake of 48.8%, is listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange and the London Stock Exchange. The company shares were traded 0.97% up at 14.6 lei by 1239 CET on the BVB.
(1euro=4.5481 lei)