Ratul Puri, promoter of Moser Baer has said that its promoter company, Moser Baer Projects Private Limited, will look at listing its solar development business in the next 12 months. Its thermal businesses also comes under Moser Baer Projects.

In an exclusive interview to CNBC-TV18 he said, "The company is looking at listing the solar development business in the next 12 months. It currently has 600 MW of solar capacity under development.”

Talking about the company’s future plans, Puri informed that the company is also planning to list thermal vertical business in the next three years.

As the company’s photovoltaic (PV) business has returned to growth path, Moser Baer is aiming at 1 GW photovoltaic capacity by 2013.

“The company may raise funds at the PV business level if needed. He is hopeful of turnaround in PV business at net income level next year. The optical business seen severe input cost hikes and the company will hike prices in optical business to offset high input cost,” Puri elaborated.

Q: What are your plans on the photovolataic business?

A: A: We have pretty aggressive expansion plans on the PV side which was to try to get to about a Gigawatt of capacity by the end of 2010. We had slowed down those expansion plans, we are adding about 100 megawatt of incremental capacity this year, which should come on-stream towards the end of fiscal and which will take our cumulative capacity to approximately 250 megawatts.

Our goal then would be to restart expansion beyond that and we are currently working on a series of plans to grow our capacity beyond that and once again target that Gigawatt type level by the 2013 period.

Q: You are targeting a Gigawatt by 2013, what about the EBITDA level, when you do you expect to be positive on the EBITDA level?

A: Our panels are significantly bankable across most parts of the world and that has allowed us to put some pricing power back into our hands with which we have seen the business turn EBITDA positive. We are already seeing an EBITDA positive scenario in the business currently. We hope as we get forward into next year that the business will turn net income positive.

Q: If you do have a target of one Gigawatt by 2013, what kind of funding would you require for that?

A: We would potentially look at funding that partially from capital raised externally, partially from cash flows generated within the PV business and partially from cash flows generated at the parent level. So we don't have any specific number or target in mind. But we would look at three potential sources to fund the capital we would need to grow to the Gigawatt type capacity level.

Q: We understand that you could possibly look at individually listing the thermal side of the power business as well as the hydro power business separately, is that accurate?

A: That is correct. Broadly we have an energy holding company, which is called Moser Baer Projects which is essentially operating in five verticals. There is a solar development vertical where we are developing solar power plants. There is a thermal vertical that is developing thermal power plant across Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, which are in a fairly advance stage and at an early stage of development. We have got incremental plants in Orissa and Jharkhand.

We have a hydro vertical that is developing plants in Himachal Pradesh and Nepal. We have a coal vertical that is developing coal mines in Chhattisgarh and we have a EPC vertical that is essentially going out and carrying out the construction of these various plants.

We would look at potentially listing individual parts of these businesses independently especially as we look at the solar development business, we may look at the potentially listing that in the near-term to medium-term.

Q: So solar would be first off the block in terms of the individual listing and when you talk about a near or medium term horizon give me your sense of what you are talking about in terms of a time frame?

A: Somewhere in the range of around 12 months or so.

Q: So you will start off with the solar and then when can we expect thermal and hydro?

A: We believe post that we would look at listing potentially the thermal business in the three year type time horizon which is when we will have the first thermal power plant commissioned and operating.