UK electricity generator Drax Group (LON: DRX) has sold a book of 90,000 small and medium (SME) business customers to French retail energy giant EDF.
The customer meter points had been acquired by the North Yorkshire-based group when it bought Opus Energy in 2017 for £340million.
In an announcement to the London Stock Exchange, Drax said other parts of the Opus business has been transferred to its core industrial and commercial (I&C) energy supply business in the seven years since.
The transfers to Drax Energy Solutions includes the renewables business holding the group’s power purchase agreements (PPAs) with renewable generators, and certain other customers.
The customer book transaction is an asset sale for the majority of the Opus customer meter points and follows the completion of a strategic review of the group’s non-core SME energy supply business, Drax said.
The firm, which owns the Cruachan Power Station in Argyll, said the sale of the retail arm of Opus to EDF Energy Customers will “further support its decarbonisation strategy”.
The firm did not disclose the price of the sale but said there would be “no change” to its EBITDA, a core measure of profitability.
It said: “Drax believes that these measures further support its decarbonisation strategy and the development of its energy solutions (customers) business which is focused on I&C customers, renewable power and energy services.
“The energy solutions business is unaffected by the sale of the Opus SME assets and there is no change to the group’s energy solutions EBITDA expectations as a result of this process.”
The transaction is subject to regulatory assessment and is expected to complete in Q3 2024.