China firm, Singapore fund eye Laguna project

An engineering unit of state-owned China National Machinery Industry Corp. (Sinomach) and Singapore-based Equis Funds Group are vying for a stake in the 800-megawatt hydropower plant project in Pangil, Laguna, being developed by businessman Gregorio Araneta III.

China CAMC Engineering Ltd. has offered to invest in the project, whose equity structure Araneta hopes to finalize by the middle of this year. It was earlier estimated that the project would cost about P10 billion.

“The Chinese are the most aggressive. They are offering everything, short of buying us out. They sought us out after finding out our project at the Department of Energy,” Araneta said in a media chat last week.

“They are going to bid for it. We have a fund, which we’re very close to, that’s also bidding,” Araneta said.

The fund referred to is Equis, which is the partner of Araneta’s holding firm Gregorio Araneta Inc. (GAI) in other renewable projects, specifically its solar farms in Ilocos and Leyte.

Equis is Asia’s biggest independent infrastructure and real asset investment manager. Since 2011, it has raised more than $2.7 billion in private equity and completed investments in 10 Asia-Pacific countries. One of its invested firms is Vena Energy, the largest renewable energy independent power producer in the region, with more than 11 GW of generation assets across Australia, Japan, India, Indonesia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Thailand.

China CAMC, which is listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, is into engineering procurement construction (EPC) projects. Its business covers industrial projects, agricultural projects, water engineering projects, power projects and communication projects.

Construction period of the hydropower plant will take about 3.5 to five years.

GAI director Crisanto Roy Alcid said the group has received feelers that investors wanted to buy 100 percent of the project. However, he noted that Araneta “prefers that we would be in it for the long term even if we take a minority position.” INQ