E.ON

E.ON SE is a German multinational electric utility company based in Essen, Germany. It operates as one of the world's largest investor-owned electric utility service providers. The name originates from the Latin word aeon, derived from the Greek αἰών aion, which means age or "infinity", with the period being added to create secondary meanings of "energy" (E) and "illumination" (ON). The company is a component of the DAX stock index. It operates in over 30 countries and has over 50 million customers. Its chief executive officer is Leonhard Birnbaum. E.ON was created in 2000 through the merger of VEBA and VIAG. In 2016, it separated its conventional power generation and energy trading operations into a new company, Uniper, while retaining retail, distribution and nuclear operations. E.ON sold its stake in Uniper through a stock market listing and sold the remaining stock to the Finnish utility Fortum. In March 2018, it was announced that E.ON would acquire the utility portion of renewable energy utility Innogy through a complex €43 billion asset swap deal between E.ON, Innogy and RWE. The deal was approved by the EU antitrust authorities in September 2019, with final execution taking place in July 2020. In 2019, E.ON became the first of the "Big Six" UK power companies to switch all of its British electricity customers entirely to renewable electricity. However the company still owns coal power in Turkey. In 2020, E.ON UK announced that it would be migrating customers over to a new subsidiary brand called E.ON Next. E.ON Next also has two million migrated customers from commercial energy firm Npower and Powershop after acquiring both companies.