At the Opportunity Day event held recently, chief finance officer Gobchai Tanasugan said the company chose the Singapore Stock Exchange instead of the Stock Exchange of Thailand because of lower foreign currency exchange risks, better tax rates, and larger number of institutional investors.

“TTCL Power Holdings’ share listing will likely be dated in the second half of next year,” he said, adding proceeds from the fund raising – of about US$100 million to $200 million – will be used for business expansion in alternative energy. The projects operated by the company – natural gas-fuelled power plants, solar farms, and coal-fired power plants – are under restructuring.

After listing, TTCL has a policy to hold not less than a 30-per-cent stake, from the current 70 per cent, in TTCL Power Holdings, said Gobchai. For this year, the company expects revenue would grow by 15 per cent over last year’s Bt22.02 billion with a net profit margin of 3 per cent, up from Bt1.92 per cent last year.

Gobchai said it expected income this quarter would be better than the last quarter, as its 120-megawatt natural-gas-fuelled power plant in Myanmar was back to normal operation.

About 45 per cent of engineering design and construction jobs worth Bt25 billion were on hand to be gradually booked for income this year.

TTCL will also participate in bidding for construction projects in the energy and petroleum industry worth Bt117 billion, and was expected to win at least one of three jobs.

Gobchai said the company is targeting production expansion of solar farms in Japan by 30MW from 25MW this year, which is expected to start operation in 2019.