Yoma Gets Go-Ahead

APR Boosts Electricity Output

Florida-based power company APR Energy announced in March that it will step up the amount of power it sends to the grid from its gas-powered plant in Mandalay Region. The company said in a statement that it would expand its plant in Kyaukse by 20 megawatts to provide a minimum of 102MW to the state-owned Myanmar Electric Power Enterprise.

The company says the plant—which has been running since May 2014 on natural gas taken from the Shwe gas pipeline running through from the Bay of Bengal to China’s Yunnan Province—provides electricity to more than 6 million people.

Yoma Strategic Holdings said in March that it had received confirmation that its lease on the site of its “Landmark” downtown Yangon hotel development would be extended.

In an update to shareholders, the company said the Meeyahta International Hotel Limited, in which it owns a controlling stake, had received a letter dated Mar. 10 from the Myanmar Investment Commission (MIC).

The MIC said “it had approved the extension of the lease in accordance to the Myanmar Foreign Investment Law for the redevelopment of the former headquarters of the Burma Railways Company into a five star hotel as a Build-OperateTransfer project,” according to the statement, which was filed with the Singapore stock exchange, where Yoma Strategic’s shares are listed.

The letter directs the Ministry of Rail Transportation to extend the lease, the update from Yoma Strategic CEO Andrew Rickards said. Alongside the hotel, the company is planning to build a massive mixed-use development that will replace the Meeyahta hotel, which closed in late 2013.

The interests of the sprawling conglomerate controlled by tycoon Serge Pun include the Star City development and the Pun Hlaing Golf Estate, both in Yangon; a business selling New Holland tractors in Myanmar; and the Balloons Over Bagan tourism operation. Mr. Pun also controls Yoma Bank.

Also in March, Yoma Strategic announced financial results for the first nine months of the 2014-15 fiscal year, disclosing that an issue of rights to new shares was oversubscribed, and that the issue had generated US$118.52 million to go toward the purchase of the Landmark development site and other investments.

The company’s revenue grew by 15.3 percent year on year to $60.4 million in the nine month period, the results said.—Simon Lewis

The fast-installation “turn-key” project is one of a series of contracts the government signed with companies in order to provide short-term power generation while longer-term solutions to Myanmar’s energy shortage are put in place.

When APR Energy first announced the Kyaukse plant, Clive Turton, the firm’s managing director for the AsiaPacific told The Irrawaddy that the company was looking at several other projects in the country. No other deals have since been announced, however.

A spokesman for APR Energy did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but Mr. Turton was quoted in the company’s statement saying: “We look forward to playing a continued role in helping Myanmar supply reliable, efficient power to its people and industries, supporting economic growth and improving overall quality of life.”—

Simon Lewis

Yangon’s Rich Could Double

Myanmar’s former capital may be about to face an epidemic of HNWI, according to a report. This is not reason to panic, however, since the initials don’t stand for a new virulent strain of influenza, but for high-net-worth individuals—the description chosen by real state consultancy Knight Frank for US-dollar millionaires in its recently published “Wealth Report 2015.”

The global report predicts that Yangon will be home to more than 3,500 such people by 2024, more than double the current number, making the city “a classic example of emerging market wealth creation.”

“Benefiting from the gradual opening up of its economy, following the introduction of democratic reforms in recent years, the city has seen strong employment growth and inward investment, with annual GDP growth at a national level predicted to eclipse that seen in India and even China in 2015 and 2016,” the report says.

“Accounting for a fifth of overall economic output, Yangon is set to be the lead beneficiary of this process.”

Simon Lewis