PHILSTAR FILE PHOTO

ALL four bidders for the P170.6-billion public-private partnership (PPP) to upgrade the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) have submitted their technical proposals, the Department of Transportation (DoTr) said.

“Having completed the opening and preliminary evaluation of four bidders, we will now proceed with the detailed technical evaluation. The tech evaluation will be conducted over a period of no longer than 20 days,” Transportation Undersecretary Timothy John R. Batan said during the opening of technical proposals for the NAIA PPP project on Monday.

The DoTr said it plans to announce the result of the technical proposal review on Feb. 5.

The DoTr is set to open the financial proposals for the project on Feb. 7 and hopes to issue the notice of award by Feb. 15.

The four groups that submitted bids for the P170.6-billion project are the Manila International Airport Consortium, Asia Airport Consortium, GMR Airports Consortium, and SMC SAP and Co. Consortium.

The signing of the concession agreement for NAIA is scheduled for March 15 while the winning bidder is expected to take over operations by September.

Transportation Secretary Jaime J. Bautista said the bidder with the biggest revenue share will win the NAIA upgrade project.

According to the concession agreement, the winning bidder is required to pay about P30 billion upfront and P2 billion a year, plus a share of revenue.

The NAIA concession agreement will run for 15 years, but can be extended by another 10. The project is structured as a rehabilitate-operate-expand-transfer arrangement under the Build-Operate-and-Transfer law. — Ashley Erika O. Jose