Gdansk/Warsaw — Poland’s Orlen said on Tuesday it had acquired Austria’s Doppler Energie, expanding the oil and gas company’s retail operations to a seventh European market.
Completion of the acquisition, for which Orlen did not disclose a price, is subject to approval from competition regulators and is planned to be finalised between 2023 and 2024.
“Today we’ve signed a deal to take over 266 stations in Austria under the brand Turmöl, which is the third largest retail brand in this market,” Orlen CEO Daniel Obajtek said.
The deal will give Orlen 10% of Austria’s retail market and a 14% share of its wholesale market and Obajtek said he expects the European Commission to approve the deal within weeks.
Doppler operates Austria’s third biggest network of gas stations that have similar profitability to the outlets Orlen bought from Hungary’s MOL last year, according to Obajtek.
Orlen aims to have a total of 3,500 gas stations by end of the decade, and to boost profits from foreign retail operations.
It also hopes to double gains from synergies from mergers, as the company identified extra proceeds from takeovers.
“The expected synergies add up to over 10 billion zlotys ($2.5 billion) in 10 years. However, this has been modified and as of today the proceeds from synergies resulting from mergers… will exceed 20 billion,” Obajtek said. $1 = 4.0533 zlotys)
(Reporting by Mateusz Rabiega, Pawel Florkiewicz and Marek Strzelecki; Editing by Louise Heavens, Jason Neely and Alexander Smith) – Reuters
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