How Does AES Corporation Categorize Its Businesses?

AES Corporation (AES) is a diversified power generation and utilities company. It operates its business under six SBUs (strategic business units). These business units, along with their respective regions, are:

• US – the United States
• Andes – Chile, Colombia, and Argentina
• Brazil – Brazil
• MCAC – Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean
• Europe – the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Kazakhstan, Bulgaria, and Jordan
• Asia – India, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, and the Philippines

These SBUs each have two lines of businesses, generation and utilities (XLU).

As of June 30, 2015, AES had a total generation capacity of 36,050 MW (megawatts), including its utilities business segment. The United States contributes only 34% of its total generation capacity. The rest of the capacity is contributed by other SBUs.

The generation businesses sell electricity under medium (two to five years) to long (more than five years) term contracts, or under short-term (less than two years, including spot transactions) agreements in competitive markets. Southern California Edison, Direct Energy, CEMEX (CX), and Eletropaulo are some counterparties with whom AES has signed long term PPAs (power purchase agreements).

AES Corporation owns and operates regulated utilities to provide electricity to end users in specific areas. AES has full or partial ownership of eight utilities and operates in cities such as São Paulo and Indianapolis. Its customer base comes from residential, commercial, industrial, and government segments.

AES also has energy storage and distributed energy generation businesses. AES Corporation is part of the Utilities Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLU). Other companies that are part of this ETF are Southern Company (SO), Duke Energy (DUK), and NextEra Energy (NEE)