Ayala readying infra project proposals

The country’s oldest conglomerate plans to join the unsolicited project bandwagon, as it plans to offer proposals in 2017 aimed at easing road congestion in Metro Manila.

AC Infrastructure CEO Rene Almendras told reporters Wednesday that the company was currently completing various feasibility studies for “alternative” projects to cut traffic in Edsa and other “hotspots” around the capital district.

Almendras declined to give other details, saying the feasibility studies were not yet finished. He noted, however, that the company, a subsidiary of the 182-year-old Ayala Corp.,  preferred projects that would require only “slight” government regulation.

“I think the reality of infra is that it has become a limiting factor to growth: growth of population, growth of the economy, growth of cities,” Almendras, who held various positions in the Cabinet of President Aquino over the last six years, said in a roundtable discussion.

Ayala joins other business groups that have made unsolicited offers since the incumbent Duterte administration signaled its willingness to entertain these.

Metro Pacific Investments Corp. is set to submit a tollroad offer near C-5 road. In recent months, San Miguel Corp. submitted a proposal for a new international airport in Bulacan while All-Asia Resources and Reclamation Corp., backed by the Tieng and Sy families, is planning a P1.3-trillion reclamation project in Sangley Point, Cavite.

Almendras said Ayala would also bid for projects in the government’s public-private partnership pipeline.

He said the company was on a P74.6-billion contract to modernize and operate Manila’s Ninoy Aquino International Airport, the country’s busiest air gateway, and the Light Rail Transit Line 2.

The Ayala Group has won, either by itself or with partners, four PPP projects thus far. It won the first-ever PPP deal under the Aquino administration, which was the 4-kilometer Muntinlupa Cavite Expressway.

With Metro Pacific Investments Corp., Ayala won the contract to provide an automated fare collection system for Metro Manila’s elevated railways and the contract to expand and operate the LRT-1. Ayala Land, meanwhile, won a deal to build the Integrated Transport System project in Taguig.

Almendras said AC Infrastructure was still targeting to be a significant earnings contributor to the Ayala Group by 2020.