ISLAMABAD: The Cabinet Committee on Privatisation (CCoP) approved the divestment of all the 96.6 per cent government shares of the Heavy Electrical Complex (HEC) to the successful bidder on Thursday.

The CCoP meeting, chaired by Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin, was briefed by Minister for Privatisation Mohammad mian Soomro and Privatisation Commission (PC) Chairman Saleem Ahmed about the successful bidding process.

IMS Engineering emerged as the successful bidder with its highest bid of Rs99.9 per share.

The PC Board has already approved the final bidding of HEC. With the approval of CCoP, the privatisation of HEC will now move to the federal cabinet for its ratification.

This is the first transaction in the industrial sector under the government’s privatisation programme.

Located on prime industrial leasehold land of about 62 acres in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Hattar Industrial Estate, HEC is engaged in manufacturing of 66KV and 132KV power transformers, with an annual designed capacity of 3,000MVA.

HEC was put on the active privatisation list by the CCoP in 2019. The transaction structure was approved in November 2020.

The federal cabinet in its meeting in December ratified the decision of the CCoP.

Published in Dawn, February 25th, 2022