One of Australia’s richest people has joined several of his peers in making a renewable energy play.
Genex Power Ltd received a takeover offer from Australian technology billionaire Scott Farquhar’s investment firm and Stonepeak Partners LLC, the Sydney-based renewable energy developer said yesterday.
Skip Capital, founded by the Atlassian Corp co-chief executive officer and his wife, Kim Jackson, and Stonepeak proposed an indicative purchase price at a 70 percent premium to Friday’s closing price.
Photo: Reuters
Farquhar’s move bolsters the ranks of Australian billionaires betting on the green energy transition in the nation, one of the world’s biggest fossil fuel exporters and per-capita emitters.
His Atlassian partner, Mike Cannon-Brookes, recently unseated half of AGL Energy Ltd’s board as he seeks to move the utility away from coal-fired generation, while Andrew Forrest, the nation’s richest man, has vowed to become a major exporter of hydrogen generated using wind and solar.
Genex is one of the few big renewable energy developers listed in Sydney after takeovers of rivals including the multibillion-dollar sale of Tilt Renewables Ltd last year. The Skip and Stonepeak venture offered A$0.23 per share for Genex, the statement said, valuing it at A$318.6 million (US$220.7 million).
The Skip Essential Infrastructure Fund has also built up a 19.99 percent stake in Genex, the group said in a statement confirming the offer. Shares in the company closed trading last week at A$0.135 per share, more than 30 percent below where it listed in July 2015.
The developer’s flagship project is the Kidston Clean Energy Hub, in the nation’s north, which is to integrate large-scale solar generation with pumped storage hydro and wind energy, its Web site shows. It has 100 megawatts of solar generation in operation and 450 megawatts of hydro, wind and battery generation under construction.
Genex yesterday also said revenue for the quarter through last month was stronger than anticipated as the price of sold electricity more than doubled from the prior period. It also reported record-high revenue from its solar farms for its financial year and its first full year of positive operating cash flow.
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