Helios acquires Oando Gas and Power for $115m

….to build mini LNG, FSRU as alternative sources of gas

 

Helios , a private Equity Fund has acquires 49 per cent stake in Oando Gas and Power while it nominee acquires another 2 per cent thereby making the equity firm majority shareholder.
Bolaji Osunsanya , managing director of Oando Gas and Power who disclosed this at the ongoing Nigeria Oil and Gas conference holding in Abuja, said the fund has big partners that continuously invest in its fund and this has encourage his company to strike a deal with them
The acquisition cost Helios $115 million and this it has automatically made it to become the biggest investors in Oando Gas and Power. However nothing has changed on the management side.
The benefits of this exercise according to him is that the company now carries it legacy as Oando which is now being complimented by deep pocketed fund, it has also created new growth areas for Oando Gas and Power, all the constraints in the infrastructure space that the company suffers because the Oando group was looking at many other things has been solved.
Helios is already and investor with Oando marketing another subsidiary of Oando Group so the two bodies are used to be co-partners before this new initiative
According to the managing director Bolaji Osunsanya , he said the company is now looking at the projects it has put on hold because of paucity of fund because it has the backing of a deep pocketed fund. “Today we are getting capital that fits with the mix of what we are suppose to do doing in the gas infrastructure space”.
He said Helios is focused on infrastructure and because of this the company would be able execute it projects as planned, adding that Helios has a very long time horizon,.
Talking on what the company is doing to mitigate against supply shortage, he said: “The company has suffered from gas supply security challenges which related the challenges we have as nation with people blowing up of gas infrastructure pipelines.”
He said this has taking its tolls on it supply and has aggravated the need for the company to look at alternative sources. He promised to work with other third parties see if the company can sign willing buyer and willing sellers gas supply contracts.
“The company is also looking at other alternative ways of brining gas order than the pipeline such as building mini LNG project, Floating storage regassification Unit (FSRU) project which would help the company create alternative sources of bringing gas to Lagos and its environs”.
Commenting on the company’s virtual gas pipeline, he said the company has just completed the building of Compressed Natural Gas(CNG) facility at Ilasa maja in Lagos.
The plant is fully operational and as at today all the capacities have been sold and it is working hard to ensure the logistics to truck the gas to consumers, it dispatching well in excess of 16 trucks from the plant from the facilities everyday.
Oando Gas and Power is the foremost developer of gas infrastructure in the country and it has constructed over 260 kilometres of gas pipeline over the last 15 years and no other companies comes close to that and plan to do more.