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Company facts

npower at a glance

RWE npower is the UK's largest electricity supplier. It generates electricity and supplies gas, electricity and related services to around 6.8 million customers through its retail business npower. The company operates and manages a flexible portfolio of power stations, and is a market leader in renewable energy development through its wind and hydro business npower renewables.

History

The npower business was formally created in October 1999 and launched in April 2000. It combines the former electricity and gas supply businesses of MEB, Calortex, MEB Powerline, National Power Energy Direct and Independent Energy, Yorkshire Electricity and Northern Electric and Gas.

Innogy was formed in 2001 when National Power demerged into International Power and Innogy. RWE acquired Innogy and the retail brand npower in May 2002. RWE Innogy was officially renamed RWE npower on 2nd August 2004. National Wind Power and Innogy Hydro also came together under the name npower renewables. For further information see the ‘Key Dates’ section below.

A range of products and sponsorships

March 2005 saw npower win two prestigious prizes at The Hollis Awards - the marketing industry’s leading sponsorship awards. npower won Best Sports Sponsorship - Test Series Cricket and our community partnership with the English Federation of Disability Sports won Best Grass Roots Sponsorship
Since its launch in April 2000, the npower brand has grown to reach 90% national awareness. In sport, npower is the title sponsor of England’s home cricket test series, the Ashes Test Series, the Women's Test Series, the county cricket Twenty 20 Cup competition and 2005 sponsors for the npower village cup. npower is also the main sponsor of the Daily Mail's Ideal Home Show.
In August 2001 the company launched, in partnership with Greenpeace, a pioneering new clean electricity product called npower Juice. For the first time customers could obtain electricity from clearly identified renewable sources at no extra cost. npower Juice customers helped speed up the development of Britain's first major offshore wind farm at North Hoyle (N.Wales) which started generating clean electricity in November 2003.
November 2003 saw npower and Greenpeace announce the creation of the npower Juice Fund, designed to assist the development of projects in other renewable energy fields such as wave and tidal energy. npower will make an annual contribution of £10 for every customer that stays with npower Juice – up to a maximum of £500,000 per year.
May 2004 saw npower become the exclusive supplier of green energy to the new Wembley National Stadium.
In October 2004 npower signed the world's biggest green energy deal with BT. The contract will provide BT with the equivalent yearly energy needed for more than 210,000 homes.

Headcount, Head Offices and Management

npower employs around 8,500 people. The head office and residential teams are based in Oak House at Junction 6 of the M5 near Worcester. Our business division, npower business, is based around the Birmingham area, predominantly in Oldbury and Solihull. Our main customer service centre is based in Peterlee in County Durham.

Key people

Andrew Duff, CEO of RWE npower

Andrew Duff has many years experience in the international energy industry. A mechanical engineering graduate by background, he has spent much of his career in the oil sector. He was International Trading Manager, Refined Products for BP before becoming Director of Strategic Planning for BP Oil, USA in 1996. He joined National Power in 1998, taking responsibility for the UK Strategy Review in 1999 and managing the power station divestment programme in the same year. Since joining the company he has built Innogy’s Trading and Asset Management business, managing the company’s exposure to fuel and wholesale prices during a period of great market uncertainty. He took up the position of Executive Director upon the demerger of Innogy from National Power. Andrew became joint CEO of RWE Innogy plc and npower on 1st October 2003.

Kevin Miles, CEO of npower Retail

Kevin was Retail Director at Yorkshire Electricity on the Supply Companies Board heading its Residential Markets. Prior to this at Yorkshire he was Customer Services Director. In April 2000 he joined npower and led the Integration Programme (integrating recently acquired Yorkshire Electricity & Northern Electric into npower), becoming Integration Director, and also acting as MD for Northern Electric on acquisition. By 2001 Kevin took responsibility for npower’s Information System developments and then its Customer Services directorate before being appointed Managing Director of the residential business in January 2003, where his responsibilities included Sales, Products, Customer Contact and Customer Relations. From January 2008 Kevin became CEO of npower Retail.

Giuseppe Di Vita, Managing Director of Retail Markets

Giuseppe's biography is coming soon.

Chris Johnson, Managing Director of Retail Operations

Chris joined npower in January 2003 as Director of Operations. A graduate chemist, Chris previously worked for Thames Water. On joining Thames Water in 1995, Chris held a variety of roles including managing the water supply operations. In 2001 Chris led the successful bid for Welsh Water's outsourcing of customer services and was appointed customer services director at Thames in April 2001. In addition he was also programme director for IT investment in customer systems. Chris is responsible for npower back office customer operations, IS design, support and development activities as well as business wide roles on infrastructure services and integration.

Simon Stacey, Retail Finance Director

Simon began his career with accountants PwC before moving to The Harpur Group where he was the Group Financial Controller, with worldwide responsibility for all accounting and reporting issues. In 1998, he took on the role of Group Financial Controller for National Power where he initially worked on management information before working on the demerger strategy. Following the demerger, he joined the successor company Innogy plc, and he has been the npower group Group Financial Controller since 2002, working on a wide range of projects and initiatives in conjunction with RWE. In July 2008 Simon was appointed as the Finance Director of npower Retail.

Jens Madrian, Managing Director of Commercial

Jens' biography is coming soon.

Julia Lynch-Williams, Director of Energy Services

Julia's biography is coming soon.

Responsibility and obligations

As a major energy business, npower is active in the community and on national issues like energy efficiency and fuel poverty:

In January 2001, npower announced that an initial £5.7 million (and up to £10 million) would be invested in reducing fuel bills and providing warmer homes for a potential 20,000 households across the country. The scheme, called Health Through Warmth, ensures that energy efficiency and other measures to help the fuel poor are targeted on those most in need. The long-term objective is to channel help to up to 250,000 householders nationally.
In February 2001, npower became one of the two major sponsors of the Government's national Warm Zones initiative to tackle fuel poverty at a local level. Following completion of the pilot phase npower continues to support Sandwell and Northumberland Warm Zones.
In 2004, RWE npower became a Percent Club member for the second time. (We are one of only 152 companies nationwide to invest more than 1% of its pre-tax profits into the communities in which it operates).
In July 2003, npower announced a £1 million scheme Savings for Life to deliver essential insulation measures to at least 2,000 identified acute fuel poor households that have no access to existing grant aid. This is an extension of npower’s existing wide-reaching Energy Efficiency Commitment programmes and is 100% funded by the company.
npower exceeded its energy savings targets under the first two Energy Efficiency Standards of Performance schemes between 1994 and 2002. Under the current Energy Efficiency Commitment scheme (2002 –2005), energy savings of 8117.4 GWh are planned.

Footnotes

RWE is Germany's fifth-largest industrial company and ranks among the world's leading multi-utility companies. Its core businesses are energy and water. The RWE Group comprises seven operating companies active in our key markets of the UK, Central and Eastern Europe and the Americas.
Figures from the Datamonitor market share monitor – November 2004.

For further information contact Leon Flexman, Elaine Lynch or Jennifer Corby at the npower press office on 0845 070 2807or contact us by email at press.office@npower.com. Find out more at the npower website at www.npower.com.

npower–Key dates

Date	Event	Customers
02 August 2004	RWE Innogy plc is officially renamed RWE npower. npower sister company National Wind Power and Innogy Hydro become npower renewables.	c6.3m
1 October 2003	Innogy becomes RWE Innogy plc as part of a global restructure.	c6.3m
September 2003	Innogy sells npower telecommunications to focus on core electricity, gas and related products.	c6.5m
May 2002	RWE acquisition of Innogy completed.	c7m
September 2001	In an innovative deal, Innogy plc swaps the distribution arm (the wires) of Yorkshire Electricity for the customer base of Northern Electric and Gas. Innogy plc, npower’s parent company is promoted to the FTSE 100 from the FTSE 250.	c7m customers
August 2001	Greenpeace partner with npower in the pioneering launch of the UK’s first renewable electricity product offered at no premium to conventional electricity supply.
2001	The first of npower’s home service products are launched e.g insurance services.
April 2001	Shareholders in Innogy plc approved the acquisition of Yorkshire Electricity to position the group as a market leading UK energy supplier.	5.5m energy customers
October 2000	National Power shareholders approve its formal demerger to form Innogy plc, npower’s parent company and International Power as separate businesses.	3.2m energy customers
September 2000	National Power (Innogy) acquires the operations of Independent Energy to add to the npower brand stable.	2.9m customers
April 2000	The npower brand is launched with a national TV advertising campaign.
November 1999	National Power announces demerger plans to form Innogy, to manage its UK power generation and supply businesses, and International Power.
October 1999	The npower business is created to represent the UK retail energy businesses of National Power including Midlands Electricity and Calortex.	2.7m customers
June 1999	National Power acquires the electricity supply business of Midlands Electricity and its 2.2 million customers.	2.7m customers
1999	The UK’s domestic electricity market is fully opened to competition.
February 1999	National Power acquires Calortex and its 500,000 gas customers.	500,000 customers
1998	The UK’s domestic gas market is fully opened to competition.
1990	Privatisation of the electricity supply industry. CEGB split into National Power, Powergen, National Grid Company and Nuclear Electric.
1986	Deregulation of the gas industry from state ownership and control.
	Pre-privatisation the UK’s power generation and national grid assets were owned and run by the Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB).