Investors in expressway project must have strong financial capacity: transport ministry

The ministry will issue the bidding documents this month.

According to the Public-Private Partnership Department, under the Ministry of Transport, international tenders will be held for eight components of the North-South expressway project.

The ministry will assess candidates’ capability and experience in executing similar projects. Enterprises will be put on the shortlist if they meet at least 60% of the requirements.

Financial capacity will account for 60% of the requirements. There are three criteria for assessing investors’ financial capacity: net asset value, equity value and ability to mobilize loans.

Specifically, investors’ net asset value and equity value must both be equal to 20%-30% of the investment in the project.

If multiple companies team up to participate in the tenders, the consortium’s financial capacity will be the total capacity of the members.

Besides strong financial capacity, the ministry will choose investors for the project based on their experience and proposed methods for executing the project, which make up 30% and 10%, respectively, of the requirements.

The 2,100-kilometer expressway project, which will run through 32 cities and provinces and connect the four key economic zones, urban areas, seaports and economic hubs, will play an important role in the country’s economic development.

In the first phase, 654 kilometers of the expressway, divided into 11 subprojects, will be built with a total investment of over VND118.7 trillion (US$5.1 billion), of which VND55 trillion will come from the State budget and over VND63.7 trillion from the private sector. The Ministry of Transport has approved the feasibility studies for these 11 subprojects, including eight public-private partnership subprojects and three others receiving State funding.