Lanco wins Rs8000 cr Kerela port project

A consortium led by Hyderabad-based infrastructure company Lanco Infratech Ltd, or LITL, will build the Rs8,000 crore Vizhinjam International Container Transshipment Port in Kerala.The port will be more than 16m deep, enabing big ships to load container cargo arriving from smaller ports, or from smaller feeder ships.LITL, which earned Rs1,647 crore in financial year 2007-08, has business interests in construction, real estate, roads, power and airports. It has tied up with Malaysian container terminal company Pembinan Radzai Sdn Bhd for the Vizhinjam project. The LITL-led consortium won the bid against three others, including a consortium led by Nagarjuna Construction Co. Ltd (that included Singapore-based Overseas Port Management Pte. Ltd and Maytas Infra Ltd), another led by Gammon Infrastructure Projects Ltd (that included Videocon Industries Ltd, Gammon India Ltd, and Sical Logistics Ltd), and the third led by DS Constructions Ltd (that included Apollo Enterprises Ltd, Zoom Developers Pvt. Ltd and Portia Management Services Ltd). Vizhinjam is located 16km south of capital Thiruvananthapuram. The port will be built on a 33-year build, own, operate and transfer basis.The consortium will develop the project in four phases with a total capacity of handling 6.5 million TEUs, or twenty-foot equivalent units, used to measure container cargo. It will construct the first phase in five years. The Vizhinjam port is expected to attract traffic now handled by international ports at Colombo in Sri Lanka, Al-Salalah in Oman, Malaysia, and Singapore.