Enel Americas shareholders approve four-way merger in Colombia

Santiago-based electric utilities group Enel Americas SA (NYSE:ENIA) announced on Tuesday it had secured the shareholder approval to merge four of the company’s subsidiaries in Colombia and Central America into one mega-entity.

The proposed merger was previously agreed with Colombian power and gas company Grupo Energia Bogota (GEB), which owns significant minority holdings in Enel Americas’ power generation and distribution subsidiaries in Colombia.

Under the proposal, the generation business, Emgesa SA ESP, would be the one to absorb power distributor Codensa SA ESP, and two other Enel Americas subsidiaries -- its renewables business Enel Green Power Colombia SAS and Chilean entity Essa2 SpA.

Essa2 holds Enel Green Power’s clean energy assets in Panama, Costa Rica and Guatemala.

The enlarged Emgesa would then become Enel Colombia, a utility major with over 4,100 MW of installed generation capacity across thermal power, hydroelectric and solar plants in four countries, and a network of power lines and substations contributed by Codensa.

Enel Americas confirmed it would control the resulting company with a 57.345% stake, while GEB would take 42.515%, or about as much each of them hold in Emgesa and Codensa at present.

“Through this operation we are creating a more robust and competitive vehicle to face the challenges of the energy transition. We are convinced that it will allow us to grow based on the pillars of sustainable development, renewable energy and technological innovation, creating value for all ”, Maurizio Bezzeccheri, general manager of Enel Americas, said in a statement.

The merger proposal now needs to go through bondholders of the involved companies, and secure the approval from Colombia regulatory agency Superintendency of Corporations, Enel Americas said.

The shareholders of GEB approved the move at an extraordinary session on June 28.

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