Michael Abrokwa VALCO Company Secretary (L) Dr. Henry Benyah, (middle) and Dan Acheampong
Volta Aluminium Company Limited (VALCO) has announced it is close to locating a Strategic Investor before the end of 2023.
This follows the approval by Cabinet for VALCO and the Ghana Integrated Aluminium Development Corporation (GIADEC) – the entity holding VALCO’s shares on behalf of the government –to identify and engage a Strategic Partner towards the retrofit (modernization) of the Smelter to bringto it to world-class standard.
VALCO Board Chairman, Dr. Henry Benyah, announced this at the Company’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) held in Accra.
While presenting VALCO’s performance for the year 2022, Dr. Benyah intimated that transaction advisors have been engaged “to manage the process of the search and selection of a Strategic Partner with the requisite technical capacity to deploy the most competitive smelter technology, backed by the needed investments and strategic global linkages in consideration for an agreed equity stake in a restructured VALCO”.
The Company has experienced relatively stable operations for the past two years as is buttressed by the results for 2021 and 2022. In comparison to its performance over the past decade, VALCO recorded its best-ever performance in 2022, second only to the results of 2021, posting an adjusted EBITDA positive return of USD5.39 million.
Reporting on the operational performance of the Company, the Chief Executive Officer, Dan Acheampong was very pleased to note that VALCO has come a long way from when it faced huge existential challenges, and the future of the smelter was threatened, to a relatively stable and productive business, in readiness for the expected massive take off with the sourcing of a strategic investor.
Mr. Acheampong told the meeting that notwithstanding improvements in performance in the last three years, the company was not out of the woods yet.
However, Team VALCO, he continued, was committed to working in line with its Principle of “continuous improvement,” leaving no stone unturned and has been building upon these improved performances to bolster confidence in the company’s ability to become a world classs melter.
A Business Desk Report