This article was displayed on the ChosunBiz MoneyMove (MM) site at 10:43 a.m. on Apr. 5, 2026.
SK ecoplant is approaching large-scale repayments of investment funds to financial investors (FI), but some say the burden of raising funds is not heavy thanks to increased cash reserves and improved earnings.
According to the investment banking (IB) industry on the 5th, SK ecoplant recently agreed to repay 800 billion won of investment funds held by FIs, reflecting an annual return of about 7.5%.
The repayments cover redeemable convertible preferred shares (RCPS) and convertible preferred shares (CPS) issued during the pre-IPO process in 2022. At that time, the company raised a total of 1 trillion won, including 400 billion won in RCPS and 600 billion won in CPS, and FIs are said to have acquired about 600 billion won worth of CPS along with about 200 billion won worth of common shares held by existing shareholders. (Related article☞[Exclusive] SK ecoplant to buy back FIs' equity at 7.5% interest)
Under the shareholders' agreement, SK Inc. is designated as the repayment obligor. However, the market view is that even if SK ecoplant, rather than another affiliate, proceeds with the repayments directly, it can comfortably withstand the liquidity burden.
According to related industries, SK ecoplant is said to have already achieved this year's annual revenue target in February–March, earlier than planned. It was not clear whether this means it posted first-quarter results exceeding last year's full-year revenue, or whether achieving the annual revenue target is effectively locked in within the first quarter. SK ecoplant also said it cannot disclose the amount of this year's revenue target.
SK ecoplant already achieved improved results last year, posting 12.1916 trillion won in consolidated revenue and 315.9 billion won in operating profit. Revenue and operating profit each rose 40% from a year earlier. An industry official said, "This is a sharp improvement even before the consolidation effects of semiconductor infrastructure affiliates are fully reflected," adding, "The momentum is already very strong this year."
The industry says SK ecoplant has improved its fundamentals by shifting its revenue structure away from construction toward artificial intelligence (AI) and semiconductor infrastructure, as well as gas and materials.
In Nov. 2024, SK ecoplant incorporated industrial gas company SK Airplus, and at the end of last year it added four materials subsidiaries under SK Materials—SK trichem, SK resonac, SK materials jnc and SK materials performance—as subsidiaries. The former SK Materials changed its name to "SK ecoplant Materials." The company has effectively built a value chain spanning from semiconductor materials to infrastructure.
The company is pushing to expand its new materials portfolio for high bandwidth memory (HBM) and next-generation semiconductor processes. Unlike in the past, when results swung with construction cycles, it is reshaping its business structure around relatively stable advanced materials and industrial gases.
In addition, in July last year SK ecoplant sold 10 million shares of its equity in Bloom Energy via a block deal at $27.6 per share, securing about 380 billion–400 billion won in cash. As of the end of last year, standalone cash and cash equivalents were about 1.7 trillion won, and current assets (assets convertible to cash within a year) were about 5.3 trillion won.
Additional cash inflows are possible. Negotiations for the sale of SK oceanplant are expected to pick up after the local elections in June. The market values the equity stake on offer in the upper-mid 400 billion won range.