MRCB to submit bid on incinerator project in Nov

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian Resources Corp Bhd (MRCB) has been short listed to bid for the 1,000-tonne per day waste-to-energy (WTE) incinerator project in Taman Beringin, Kepong and is due to submit its bid in November.
"We are one of those short listed. We will put in the best bid that we can to win it but at the end of the day it is a tender process. It is not within our control and we are fighting against the bigger boys as well, so let's see how the tender will turn out," its CFO Ann Wan Tee told reporters after its EGM yesterday.
"It depends on the government, how long it takes to actually do the evaluation. I'm hoping (that it will take about) three months, after which they will come back and tell us who won the tender," he added.
Ann said the project is expected to be awarded on a concession basis and that it will take between three and four years to build it. The project is reportedly expected to cost up to RM800 million.
"This WTE project allows me to grow the business in MRCB rather than just look at property development. I also have a concession arm, therefore it is to grow the concession arm as well," he said.
MRCB's tender book currently stands at RM1.1 billion for construction and RM1.8 billion for property development.
"For property, we have enough on our plate because recently we won the Kwasa Land Sdn Bhd project (MX-1). Kwasa Land itself is 64 acres already. Plus all the land (over 100 acres in the Klang Valley and Penang) that we have, we have quite a sizeable chunk in terms of development, but that won't stop us from looking at new opportunities. The idea is to continue to grow, and build pipelines moving forward," he said.
On whether it is disposing more assets, Ann said: "Yes and no. If you look at our announcement, we talked about doing the real estate investment trust (REIT) with Quill. The REIT is in the process…it is disposing of assets to the REIT but we still hold some management interest in the REIT, therefore yes and no. We dispose some but we retain some of the interest." He declined to reveal further details.
Ann said 2014 is a transition year for MRCB whereby it is working towards improving its profit margins and hopes to have a "stable" profit margin by 2015 or 2016 as it rolls out more property project launches.
"At the moment profit margin for property development is very low. Last year was a loss so effectively it was a negative margin. We are trying to grow that margin this year. It is going to be long-haul because you cannot change something immediately, so this year is probably a transition year for us."