TWO of six applicants have been shortlisted in a tender for construction and operation of five selected stretches of the D1 highway between Martin and Prešov in the first phase of the planned public-private partnership (PPP) highway projects estimated at €1.45 billion. One of the selected consortiums includes two Slovak firms, namely Doprastav and Váhostav - SK. Marián Jánošiík, the Transport Ministry's spokesman told the SITA newswire on January 29 that two bidders qualified in the tender: the French-Swiss consortium comprised of Vinci Concessions S.A. and Skanska Infrastructure Development AB, and a six-member international consortium featuring French firms Bouyges Travaux Publics SA and Colas SA, Hungarian company Intertoll-Europe Zrt., Portuguese firm Mota Engil, SGPS, SA and the two above-mentioned Slovak companies. An eleven-member commission at the Transport Ministry chose the two bidders based on its evaluation of whether they met the set tender criteria. The commission could have chosen a maximum of four applicants.
A concession agreement in the first PPP project applies to project documentation, construction, funding, and operation and maintenance of the five selected stretches of the D1 highway, which have a total length of 74.84 kilometres. The concession will expire in thirty years at most.
