ACEN extends $25-million support to telecom tower builder

By Alena Mae S. Flores – November 6, 2023, 9:00 pm
from manilastandard.net

ACEN Corp. through subsidiary ACEN Renewables International Pte. Ltd. (ACRI) made available a $25-million (P1.4 billion) facility to Yoma Strategic Investments Ltd. (YSIL) to fund the micro grids for telecommunications towers of Yoma Micro Power Pte. Ltd. (YMP).

ACEN said its executive committee authorized the company and ACRI  to enter into an agreement with Yoma Strategic Holdings Ltd. (Yoma) and wholly-owned subsidiary YSIL to restructure YSIL’s outstanding loan of $27 million inclusive of interest with ACRI.

“Under the restructure agreement, YSIL will purchase the loan from ACRI, payable within a ten-year period, with a Yoma parent guarantee,” ACEN said.

YMP  installs and maintains solar and solar-hybrid power plants for telecom companies. YMP has powered more than 600 telecom towers with reliable and cost-effective renewable energy.

YMP’s investors include the Myanmar conglomerate Yoma Group, Norfund, International Finance Corp., the World Bank Group’s development finance institution and Alakesh Chetia – the founder of the company.

ACEN earlier said the executive committee approved the investment in YMP which  “involves the provision of sustainable and affordable telecom tower solarization solutions in the Philippines.”

ACEN expects set to reach its 5,000 megawatts (MW) or 5 gigawatts (GW) goal within the year, two years ahead of its 2025 target.

“ACEN  has around 4.5 GW of RE capacity across our global portfolio and we expect to cross the 5 GW mark within the next few months, two years head of our 2025 goal,” ACEN president and chief executive Eric Francia said earlier.

Francia said ACEN is now “4x away” from reaching its vision of 20 GW of renewables by 2030.

“The Philippines will continue to be our core and single largest market, accounting for about 40 percent of our business. This means we expect to grow our Philippine renewable capacity from 1.7 GW today to more than 4x to 8 GW by 2030,” he said.