JXTG Holdings to start gas retail biz in 2018

January 3, 2018

Tokyo- JXTG Holdings Inc. aims to start gas retailing in and around Tokyo in 2018 after Japan's gas retail market was fully liberalized in April last year, President Yukio Uchida has said.

"We want to make a start as early as possible," Uchida said in a recent interview.

The oil and metal giant has already acquired 340,000 customers in its electricity retailing operations. It hopes to sell gas and electricity in a package in order to win more retail customers.

"We may team with another company in gas safety and maintenance services," Uchida said.

JXTG will also consider supplying gas from a plant seen starting operation in Kawasaki, Kanagawa Prefecture, near Tokyo, in April 2020. The gas plant is being built in a joint project with Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. and Osaka Gas Co. .

The company was created through the merger of JX Holdings Inc. and TonenGeneral Sekiyu K.K. in April 2017.

In the six months through September that year, JXTG achieved 17.5 billion yen in cost cuts and other positive effects arising from the merger, more than double the target of 8.2 billion yen.

The company hopes to hit its merger synergy target of 100 billion yen over the first three years, earlier than planned, Uchida said.

JXTG will set a rough plan to shut and integrate oil-refining and other production bases by the end of March this year so that it can start the streamlining measures in 2019, he said.

Last year, the company announced a plan to stop the production of oil products at its Muroran plant in Hokkaido, northernmost Japan, at the end of March 2019. Jiji Press