ANKARA
Limak/Cengiz/Kolin/Ma-Pa/Kalyon joint venture group offered the highest bid of 22.152 billion euros for the construction and 25-year lease of the third airport in Istanbul.
Tender for the third airport in Istanbul took place in Ankara's Esenboga International Airport on May 3.
Fifteen Turkish and two foreign companies received approval for their technical capabilities to build the third airport.
The company promising to pay the highest rent is Limak/Cengiz/Kolin/Ma-Pa/Kalyon Consortium, a joint venture of only local companies.
The airport will be constructed under the build-operate-transfer model.
Istanbul's 3rd airport to be "world leader" in passenger capacity
The third airport to be built in Istanbul is expected to be the world's largest with a capacity of 150 million passengers when completed.
Held at the Esenboga Airport of Turkish capital of Ankara, the tender bid for the airport was made with the "build-operate-transfer" model.
The third airport in Istanbul will hold a capacity of 150 million passengers when the construction is completed.
The four-stage project aims to build a fully-equipped airport with a capacity of 90 million passengers at the first stage.
The airport will consist of 680,000 square meters of main terminal, 170,000 square meters of two terminal buildings as a second terminal or a satellite terminal, a total of 88 passenger boarding bridges, parking place for 12,000 vehicles, 3 independent air fields that complies international standards and enables wide-body aircrafts to land in or take off easily, 8 parallel taxi ways, an apron of about 4 billion square meters, 3 technic blocks, a tower, VIP lounge, cargo and general aviation terminals and other social facilities including a hospital, a place of worship and congress centers.
"Hopefully, we will put the third airport of Istanbul into service by the end of 2018"
Chairman of the Executive Board of Limak Company Nihat Ozdemir spoke on Friday after winning the bid for the third airport in Istanbul.
Speaking on behalf of the Limak/Cengiz/Kolin/Ma-Pa/Kalyon joint venture group, the group with the highest offer in the bid, Ozdemir stated that the bid was transparent, open and out-of-doubt.
"We won the bid by offering a lease of 22.1 billion euros plus VAT for 25 years and we are to invest 10.2 billion euros," he said.
Answering a question on the starting date of airport construction, Ozdemir said that they needed a specific length of time to prepare the latest version of the exact project, to determine the financing model and also for expropriations and permits.
"Our Minister of Transport, Maritime Affairs and Communications as well as the Directorate of State Airports Authority (DHMI) are in a hurry. I guess we aim to start the construction within a year at the latest," he added.
Ozdemir also noted that they will hopefully put the third airport of Istanbul into service by the end of 2018.
