7.11.19

Jewar airport race

The bidding process to select a developer for the Jewar international airport crystallised into a four-horse race between leading aviation and corporate heavyweights. The four shortlisted technical bids belong to Delhi International Airport Ltd, Zurich Airport AG, Anchorage Infrastructure (backed by the Canada-based Fairfax Holdings) and Indian conglomerate Adani Enterprises.

The companies were picked from a pool of 20 that had participated in the bid floated on May 30 this year.

This was the first half of the bidding. The Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority, which is UP’s nodal agency for the project, will study proposals before accepting financial bids later this month (on November 29) from the shortlisted firms. The developer for the airport, which is chasing a 2023 deadline for its first phase, will be finalised in January. YEIDA CEO Arun Vir Singh said the four bidders participating in the final leg have been found eligible on the technical front.

“However, analysis of financial parameters and metrics forwarded by them is going to be paramount in the entire process. Our focus would be on revenue generation plans of the four bidders.” The UP government has formed a special purpose vehicle, Noida International Airport Ltd, to manage the airport project. The bids, under UEIDA’s supervision, were floated by NIAL.

DIAL, the GMR group-led consortium, has the right of first refusal for the Jewar project under rules that allow this to the operator of an existing airport if a new airport is coming up within a 150 km radius (the distance between IGI and Jewar is less than that). Hence, if DIAL’s bid is up to 10% higher than the lowest bid, it will get an opportunity to match it. DIAL suffered a net loss of Rs.11.7 crore on a revenue of Rs.3,793 crore in 2018-19 as against a profit of Rs.38 crore on a revenue of Rs.4,042 crore in 2017-18.

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