Construction activities cement Megawide’s 52% profit hike in Q1

Construction and engineering firm Megawide Corp. posted P491.23 million in first quarter net profit attributable to equity holders of parent firm, around 52 percent higher year-on-year on robust construction revenues.

Including profits attributable to minority interest, Megawide’s first quarter net profit rose by 55 percent to P573.16 million.

Megawide posted a 119-percent or P3.21-billion increase in consolidated revenues compared to the same quarter last year, with core construction business contributing 93 percent.

Megawide chief financial officer Oliver Tan said:  “The country’s property sector continues to be strong, buoyed by the growing demand for residential and especially office spaces primarily from the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry. We are proud to be a contractor-of-choice for prime Philippine property developers.”

Construction revenues improved by 134 percent or P3.13 billion due to revenues generated from new projects such as the first phase of the Meridian Park of DoubleDragon, Le Grand BPO Cluster phase 1 and 2 of Megaworld, 8990 Tower in Edsa and Tondo of 8990 Holdings Inc., Landers Warehouse Balintawak & Otis of Southeast Asia Retail Inc. and three solar power farm projects.

“Megawide’s foray into contracts for renewable energy facilities was a testament to the company’s strategy of diversifying and enhancing our experience and expertise to be ahead of the curve,” Tan said.

The enhanced construction revenue was topped by P2.5 billion worth of new contracts for the year’s first quarter. These included Phase 2 of Meridian Park of DoubleDragon, 10 West and St. Moritz of Megaworld, and Cyberpark Phase 2 of the Araneta Group.

Megawide has likewise started to unlock values from its diversification into infrastructure projects. Revenues from operations of the Mactan-Cebu International Airport (MCIA) contributed P431 million. Together with Bangalore-based partner GMR Infrastructure Limited, the group took over operations of the MCIA in November 2014, using the public private partnership (PPP) framework. Doris Dumlao-Abadilla