American Electric Power is looking to snap up a utility upon the completion of its divestiture of SEEBOARD and has drawn up a shopping list of six companies, with NiSource topping the list, says an investment banker who has spoken to AEP about its expansion plans. AEP is not thought to have approached NiSource yet. Calls to E. Linn Draper, chairman, president and ceo of AEP, and Gary Neale, chairman and president of NiSource, were not returned. Pat Hemlepp, a spokesman at AEP in Columbus, Ohio, and Bill Keegan, a spokesman at NiSource in Merrillville, Ind., declined to comment, citing company policy.
May 19, 2002