Npower scales back its telecoms strategy

Npower is ditching plans to become a home services brand and is shifting its focus away from telecoms and onto the gas and electricity market.

It is understood that the shift in strategy follows Andrew Duff’s appointment as the new chief executive in September last year. Duff joined npower from parent company Innogy and replaced Steve Fletcher, who was responsible for the launch of the npower brand (MW September 12, 2002). At Innogy, Duff headed Regenesys, its fuel cell technology business.

A spokesman for the company says: “The marketing will now be focused more on gas and electricity products, though the home services model still works. We are not scaling back our telecoms offering but instead increasing the focus on our core energy business.” Npower has 6.5 million gas and electricity customers.

Npower has 6.5 million gas and electricity customers, well behind Powergen, which has 8.4 million customers following its acquisition of TXU Energi.

There are also rumours that rival Centrica is considering axing its Goldfish credit card business and hiving off its British Gas Communications division as part of a review of its operations.

Npower launched its telecoms service, npower Communications, in May 2001. The launch was supported by a press campaign created by TBWA/London.

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