VERBUND, the leading Austrian electricity company, has reached an agreement with OMV to acquire a 51% stake in the Gas Connect Austria, one of the gas transmission operators in Austria.

With this transaction OMV is pursuing its strategy of exiting the regulated gas transport business and engaging in proactive portfolio management, while VERBUND expands its regulated network business from electricity to gas transmission networks and makes a further step to sector integration of gas and electricity.

VERBUND states that the “importance of the gas network will grow significantly in future as it will increasingly be used to transport green gases such as green hydrogen. In the long term, we see a global hydrogen economy, one in which large quantities of energy need to be transported internationally. This makes the purchase of Gas Connect Austria a key strategic step for VERBUND.” Frontier advised VERBUND during the process on the strategic fit of Gas Connect Austria.

Based on different future decarbonisation scenarios we assessed the impact from Gas Connect Austria on the current and future VERBUND portfolio.

Frontier regularly advises companies on transactions, the future of gas and strategic issues.

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