Norwalk’s Verde Energy being acquired by Houston firm Spark Energy

Retail energy services company Spark Energy has entered into a purchase and sale agreement for the acquisition of Verde Energy, the Norwalk-based independent renewable energy supplier.

Expected to be completed in the second half of this year pending regulatory approval, the agreement calls for Houston-based Spark to pay $45 million in cash at closing and installment payments totaling $20 million over the following 18 months.

The deal was announced as part of Spark”™s quarterly earnings statement. “We expect this acquisition to add approximately $25 million of annual adjusted EBITDA after synergies and will add approximately 145,000 RCEs to our portfolio, bringing our total RCE count to nearly 1 million RCEs,” said Spark President and CEO Nathan Kroeker, referring to residential customer equivalents, a measurement used to denote the typical annual commodity consumption by a single-family residential customer.

“Verde provides us with a 100 percent renewable energy brand and additional capabilities with an established presence in 40 utility service territories across eight states,” Kroeker added.

For the three months ended March 31, Spark posted what Kroeker called “our strongest first quarter in the company’s history,” with record Adjusted EBITDA of $34.2 million, record Retail Gross Margin of $64.3 million, and Net Income of $11.4 million.