GMR wins 2nd airport project in Maldives

Private Indian airport developers are now becoming a force to reckon with globally. The GMR Group on Thursday beat the Aeroport De Paris (that operates airports in Paris region including Charles de Gaulles) to win the bid to construct the $360-million airport in Male. The only other bidder was the GVK Group. This project also includes building a seaplane port also. Three parties namely Aeroport De Paris, France- TAV, Turkey consortium; Zurich Airport-GVK consortium and the consortium of GMR Infrastructure-MAHB (Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad) consortium were invited by the Maldives Government to take part in the keenly contested international bid process which was monitored by IFC, Washington. Speaking to TOI, P Sripathy, CEO, GMR Hyderabad International Airport, said that the Male airport is already existing and profit-making airport. GMR will sign the deal papers in a week and six months later it will take over the operations of the airport, which is at present run by the government of Maldives.

The first of modernization will be completed by 2014, and the GMR group envisages an investment of $300 million, he said. The mandate is for the next 25 years. A unique feature of the MIA is that it includes the Sea-Plane port also. Incidentally, this is the second airport that GMR has taken up in Maldives as they had previously signed a MoU with the government of Maldives for the modernization and operation of the Hanimaadhoo airport situated in the Northern Islands of Maldives. With this, the group now has five airports in its portfolio. It has developed and commissioned the greenfield international airport at Hyderabad. The group, besides operating and modernizing the existing Delhi International Airport, has also constructed a brand new integrated terminal T3 which will be operational in July 2010. The group has also built a new terminal, designed to handle 20 million passenger capacity, at the Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen International Airport in Turkey and is operating it successfully.

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The above article was extracted from Skyline updates of Skyline College. Skyline College is amongst the top MBA and BBA institutes in Delhi, Gurgaon (NCR).