Ayala’s ACEN eyes capital raising for more renewables 

ACEN Corp. is not slowing down its renewables expansion to hit 8,000 megawatts by yearend, with a capital-raising initiative on its radar even as geopolitical risks hound the global market.

At the Ayala firm’s annual stockholders’ meeting in Makati City, its president and CEO Eric Francia said ACEN was exploring all options to secure fresh funds for the rollout of more clean power assets.

Francia expressed hope for pursuing fundraising activities in the next six to 12 months.

He noted that conducting a stock rights offering, previously targeted at P30 billion, remains on the table.

But Francia could not provide figures on how much the company intends to raise.

“Timing and structure will ultimately depend on prevailing market conditions,” the CEO said.

“We continue to closely monitor external factors, including geopolitical developments in the Middle East, inflation trends, interest rate movements and overall capital market sentiment,” he added.

Francia, however, said that the firm was “in no rush” as ACEN assesses its capital strategy.

“But certainly within the year, we would like to have a firm view in terms of what our capital strategy is and get going with those decisions,” he said.

This year, ACEN is boosting its investments to more than P80 billion, significantly higher than the actual spending that reached P55 billion in 2025.

About 75 percent of the investment for 2026 would boost the Philippine operations of the Ayala Group’s listed energy arm. Several solar and wind facilities are in the pipeline.

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ACEN will also scale up its investments in battery energy storage systems to complement the expansion of its solar portfolio.

“I believe that we should be on track to get to eight-plus gigawatts by the end of the year. That would add around a gigawatt [1,000 MW] plus of new capacity—not operational, but we expect to be starting the construction of new capacity around the region,” Francia said.

Aside from the Philippines, ACEN is present in Australia, Vietnam, Lao PDR, Indonesia and India.

Due to lower power prices and the temporary shutdown of some Northern Luzon wind assets, ACEN saw a 60-percent plunge in net income last year. Profit fell to P3.8 billion from P9.36 billion.

Revenues also dropped by 14 percent to P32 billion against the previous P37.3 billion.