Finance & Funding

More than 300 invited customers and guests attended the grand opening of Liebherr’s new sales and service centre in Miami, Florida. The new state-of-the-art facility will serve as a major hub for Liebherr’s maritime cranes division and will further strengthen business relations with Central and South America and the Caribbean region. In terms of logistics, the sales and service centre is said to be ideally located: the port of Miami and Miami International Airport are in close proximity to the new

A loan from Saudi Arabia will help fund construction of a major road link in Kenya. The US$27 million package is being provided on a 30 year loan by the Saudi Monetary Fund. This will be used to help pay for a $130 million project to build the new Mudogashe-Nunow road with work commencing in 2014.

A group of seven banks is to fund the construction of the third Bosporus Bridge crossing in Turkish commercial centre Istanbul. A group of six Turkish banks, Garanti Bankasi, Halk Bankasi, Is Bankasi, Vakiflar Bankasi, Ziraat Bankasi, and Yapi Kredi Bankasi, is being joined by the Netherlands-based Garantibank International to provide the necessary US$2.3 billion of funding required for the project. A joint Italian-Turkish consortium comprising Astaldi and IC Ictas will build the bridge, which will reduce c

Research from business intelligence specialist Timetric suggests that the market for infrastructure construction is growing fast in the Philippine. Timetric’s data shows that infrastructure accounted for 37.3% of the country’s construction sector and was worth US$9.6 billion in 2012. The market grew at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 12.12% and is expected to reach a CAGR of 8.19% by 2017, having been boosted by the need to repair flood damage that occurred in 2012. The country’s construction ind

A note of cautious optimism can be seen at the Austrian contractor Strabag, with the release of its half year results. The company saw turnover of € 5.6 billion for the first half of 2013, a drop of 7 % from the same period for the previous year but with some of this fall coming from weather-related issues that delayed the start of construction acitivity. However the company says that the impact of the weather on its performance should be made up by the year end. Strabag is a major contractor and is Central

The recent bankruptcy of the Austrian contractor Alpine Bau has affected a number of key projects across Europe in countries including Norway, Poland and now Romania. Following Alpine Bau’s bankruptcy, Romania’s national roads authority, CNADNR, cancelled the Austrian contractor’s contract to build a section of highway from Nadlac-Arad. So far, Alpine Bau has been paid €69.5 million to build a 16.6km section of the highway and around 85% of the work has been completed. It is not clear at this stage how the

Volvo CE reports that its operating margin has recovered in the second quarter of 2013, although the firm has been hit by weaker sales, especially in the mining industry. This situation reflects the continued slowdown in the size of the total market for construction equipment and the company’s sales were down 19% during the period. However the firm said that behind the headline figures there were underlying positives, not least a good order intake and improving trends in China, Europe and the Middle East, a

According to consultancy firm Nippon Koei, Paraguay needs about US$5 billion to modernise all its local transport system over a period of ten years, encompassing roads, railway and air. Road projects worth $2.21 billion are currently being carried out using government funds. Remaining investments for road infrastructure have been calculated by Nippon Koei at $1.6 billion from Public-Private Partnerships, followed by $374 million from private funds, and public funds ($1.05 billion). About 15% of roads are in

The US$2.6 billion, 30-year municipal bonds issued to pay for the longest traffic beltway in America are reported to be priced cheaper at around $97, with a higher yield of 5.15%. Bloomberg claims the bonds for the Grand Parkway in Houston – a 290km (180 miles) road circling the city - could have been sold by the Texas Department of Transportation during a much healthier market period from as early as April this year. Also known as Texas State Highway 99, the Grand Parkway opened its first section in 1994.