Finance & Funding

Construction of the second tube of the Karawanks Tunnel connecting Austria and Slovenia is now going ahead. The work will be headed by Austrian contractors, ARGE Swietelsky Tunnelbau and Swietelsky Baugesellschaft. The 7.8km-long tunnel route runs under the Alpine Karawanks mountain range. The Austrian motorway operator Asfinag is investing around €168 million into the project, while the European Commission is providing €25 million. The work being carried out will include building new rescue routes as wel

Funding from Japan will help pay for a major tunnel project in Nepal. The work is expected to cost close to US$200 million and includes building two tunnel stretches. The project was first put forward in 2010 and work is now intended to commence in 2020, with its completion scheduled for 2023. The tunnel sections will be built in the area close to Bhaktapur, which lies to the east of capital Kathmandu. Once the links are complete this is expected to reduce traffic congestion to the eastern side of Kathmandu

Approval has been given for 10 key road projects in Vietnam. A portion of the funding required will be sourced via an allotted budget for the 2016-2020 period. The budget is for some US$643.7 million, although this also includes funding for four rail projects as well as the 10 key road projects. The approval has come from Vietnam's National Assembly Standing Committee. One of the priority road projects is for the road connection between the Hanoi - Hai Phong Expressway and the Cau Gie-Ninh Binh Expressway.

Newly available data reveals that construction equipment sales are showing further growth in in the second quarter of 2018. The report reveals that retail sales of construction and earthmoving equipment in the UK market grew by 3.8% in the second quarter of 2018, compared with the same period in 2017. This is according to the UK equipment statistics exchange provided by data processing specialist Systematics International and run in partnership with the Construction Equipment Association (CEA). Th

Budimex and Strabag have won a contract to design and build 16km of Poland’s four-lane A1 highway between Tuszyn and Bełchatów. The €111 million deal with the Polish General Directorate for National Roads and Highways is scheduled for completion within 32 month, excluding winter months. The entire section will be concrete and includes two junctions, 17 bridges, several intersections and access roads, noise barriers and wildlife crossings.

Austrian construction firm Strabag and Bulgarian firm GBS-Infrastructure Construction have won the contract to build the 32.4 km Sofia-Kalotina motorway. Cost of the 32.4kmn four-lane project is estimated at €120 million with completion set for 2020. The Kalotina motorway will run from the capital Sofia’s ring road to the border town of Kalotina where it will connect with Serbia’s A4 motorway. It is also part of 6,100km 10-country European route E80 running from the Portuguese capital Lisbon to the

Despite global supply chain challenges, sales for Terex Cranes grew 10% to $335 million in the second quarter this year. Terex Corporation also reported an overall strong second quarter 2018 sales of US$1.4 billion, up 19% versus Q2 2017, with increased sales and backlog in all three business segments. The company said that results were driven by its ongoing corporate Execute to Win business strategy and during a period of broad-based growth. The company said that the global cranes market is generally