IPO of Upper Solu Hydro Electric Company Approved by SEBON

The IPO issue of Upper Solu Hydro Electric Company is now approved.

The company had submitted an application to the Securities Board of Nepal (SEBON) to issue an IPO for 24.50% of its issued capital. The regulator approved the IPO issue yesterday, i.e. Baisakh 7 (April 20).

With this, the company will now issue an IPO to the locals and the general public. The public issue will be for 3,307,500 units. Meanwhile, the company has 13,500,000 shares registered.

NMB Capital Ltd has been appointed the issue manager for the IPO issuance. Note that the date of the IPO issue hasn't been declared yet.

Incorporated on May 28, 2010, as a private limited company Upper Solu Hydro Electric Company Limited (USHEC) was later converted to public limited company on April 14, 2016, to facilitate public participation. The company is operating a 23.5MW Solu HEP in Solukhumbu district, Province 1 of Nepal. The project is a run of the river (R-o-R) type and has been developed at 40% probability of exceedance (Q40). The project started its business operation from March 23, 2020, and was developed at a total cost of NPR 5,000 million at a debt to equity ratio of 73:27. The developed 23.5MW Solu HEP project is one of the Super-Six projects that were studied initially by the Department of Electricity Development, Nepal (DoED).

The paid-up capital of the company as of mid-January 2022 is NPR 1,019.25 million which is 100% promoter held. As on same date, the major promoters Ms. B.E.S. P. Ltd. (~26%), Mr. Prabin Shrestha (~11%), Mr. Dineshlal Shrestha (~9%), Mr. Sureshlal Shrestha (~9%) and Mr. Rajeshlal Shrestha (~8%) and other 189 shareholder aggregately holding nominal shares aggregating to ~37% of total paid-up capital.