Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], April 11 : Ad Electricity Mumbai Ltd (Ad Electricity) topped the country's 71 electricity distribution compes for its overall governance including
Financial Sustainability, Performance Excellence and External Environment, said a press release from Ad press release.
According to the release, in the Ministry of Power's 11th edition of the 'Annual Integrated Rating and Ranking' of the country's power distribution utilities, Ad Electricity secured the 1st rank with Grade A+ and the highest integrated score of 99.6 out of 100.
The rating report, published on Monday, is prepared by McKinsey and Company and the assessment is based on the accounts of the past three financial years, from 2019-2020 to 2022- 2023.
Early this month, Ad Electricity announced the least tariff hike among Maharashtra's discoms for the period reviewed under the Multi-Year Tariff mechsm. This demonstrates the benefits to the end users on account of Ad Electricity's prudent financial and operational practices.
In the exhaustive evaluation exercise, Ad Electricity emerged as the best and only private utility to be rated in the top five and is also one of 15 discoms to not have any negative marking.
"Over the last five years, our customer-centric focus has enabled us to reduce and stabilize tariffs, optimise power purchase costs and improve operational efficiencies through state-of-the-art technology interventions such as SCADA, automated workflow management and a digital-first approach," said Kandarp Patel, MD, Ad Electricity Mumbai Ltd.
"These efforts have made us not only Mumbai's but one of India's most competitive electricity providers, as recognized by the Power Finance Corporation and the Ministry of Power. This
independent recognition is a testament to our commitment to serving our customers with reliable, affordable, and sustainable electricity," Patel added.
He also added, "We will continue to enhance our services and infrastructure to exceed global benchmarks. We also recommit ourselves to doubling our share of renewable energy to 60%. This is our commitment to Mumbai and to all our stakeholders who have stood by us through
this journey to Number One."
The Annual Integrated Rating and Ranking exercise is carried out by the nodal agency Power Finance Corporation Ltd as per the framework approved by the Ministry of Power since 2012. It covers 71 power distribution utilities comprising 45 state discoms, 14 private discoms and 12 power departments across India.
The exercise provides a blueprint for stakeholders to assess performance, identify gaps, measure the impact of steps taken and plan ahead.
The release also informed that Ad Electricity scored 12.8 out of 13 for Performance Excellence, covering Billing Efficiency, Low Distribution Loss, Collection Efficiency and Corporate Governance. Under the External Environment, Ad Electricity scored 11.9 out of 12 for subsidy realized (last 3 FYs), loss takeover by the State Government, Government Dues (last 3 FYs), Tariff Cycle Timelines and Auto Pass-Through of Fuel Costs.
"Under Financial Sustainability, Ad Electricity scored all 75 marks for its ACS -ARR Gap (Cash adjusted), Days Receivable, Days Payable to Generation Compes, Adjusted Quick Ratio, Debt Service Coverage Ratio (Cash Adjusted) and Leverage Debt / EBITDA (Cash adjusted)," added the release further.
For all the above parameters, Ad Electricity has scored in the top matrix, and the superior ranking is a result of a set of best practices in the industry, including the following:
Digitized bill generation and payments - partnering with UPIs and payment gateways to facilitate ease of payment for the customers.
Deployment of advanced meter reading capabilities which reduces bill errors significantly.
Analytics and MIS systems to curb power thefts - stronger vigilance drives. These efforts have led to reducing distribution losses from 9.1% to 6.7% over the last 2 years.
Strong working capital management leading to the highest score for quick ratio.
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