FRANKFURT: Executives at Uniper, a spin-off business uniting German energy giant EON's fossil fuel operations, said on Monday the new firm is in good shape for a September stock market debut.
"We are very close to the goal," chief executive Klaus Schaefer told journalists on a conference call.
Uniper expects to publish its prospectus in early September for a mid-month flotation, he said.
EON -- Germany's largest energy company -- announced the creation of Uniper two years ago to spin off its gas and coal power plants, gas storage and gas and electricity trading arms.
The parent company will focus on renewable energy, nuclear power, and services, aiming to shield itself from some of the heavy costs of Germany's transition to new forms of electricity generation.
First-half results published by Uniper on Monday as if it had been operating as a separate entity showed it would have booked a loss of 3.9 billion euros ($4.4 billion), in part due to big writedowns on the value of its fossil-fuel plants.
Profitability on power generated from gas and coal has suffered heavy blows from low wholesale electricity prices and competition from government-subsidised renewables.
"We have big challenges ahead of us," Uniper chief financial officer Christopher Delbrueck said.
But the firm pointed to an underlying, or operating, profit as measured by EBITDA of 1.5 billion euros in the first half as evidence its shares would be a good buy for investors.
Operating profit was up around 50 percent over the previous year's figure, largely due to better market conditions for gas.
The firm is selling off around 2.0 billion euros of assets, a process it hopes to finalise by the end of 2017.
"We will also have to bring down staffing costs," CEO Schaefer said, adding that layoffs were "not ruled out as a last resort" -- although "there are many measures we can take before it gets to that."
Uniper employs around 15,000 of EON's formerly 56,000-strong workforce.
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