Concor Consortium to Bid for Colombo Container Terminal
By Aiswarya Lakshmi
Monday, October 10, 2016
Container Corporation of India (Concor) has formed a consortium with APM Terminals B.V., John Keells Holdings and Maersk Line in order to bid for the development of East Container Terminal in Colombo, reports Hindu Business Line.
The total project value is likely to be about $550-600 million. The Colombo Port currently has four container terminals.
In 2008, a new harbour basin, the Colombo South Harbour was developed to accommodate deep draft vessels and the Sri Lanka Ports Authority (SLPA) decided to develop four new terminals, each with a capacity of 2.4 million TEU’s (twenty-foot container equivalent unit - a measure used in container shipping) to cater to increasing demand.
The concession for the first terminal was awarded to China Merchant Holdings in 2012 and became fully operational in 2015 as Colombo International Container Terminal (CICT).
This move is being seen by many in the industry as a move to give an Indian company an opportunity to bid for the project after the earlier contract was awarded to a Chinese entity.