Major investment interest by foreign companies in Attiki Odos of Greece

Investment interest in the concession contract for the Athens beltway, Attiki Odos, exceeded expectations with a total of eight bids submitted by Thursday, vindicating the estimates by state officials who had spoken of a strong presence of foreign investment and construction groups, ekathimerini.com reports.

Most of the eight bids submitted concern purely foreign bidders from countries such as Spain, Australia, Italy, Portugal, and France. Meanwhile, Greek construction firm Intrakat stayed out of the tender, even though it was locked in talks with two consortiums. On Thursday sources from the company did not rule out its participation in the next phase of the tender by joining one of the bidders.

The starting line for Greece’s biggest concession contract, calculated to reach a price between 2 and 3 billion euros, saw four consortiums with the involvement of Greek companies: They are the consortium of GEK Terna and FS Ark Holdco, the Aktor Concession-Avax-Ardian venture, the cooperation between Mytilineos, Vinci Highways, Vinci Concessions and Mobility Partner, and the consortium of Macquarie and Fincop Infrastructure, a vehicle with the participation of the Copelouzos Group. Australian firm Macquarie is one of the biggest infrastructure funds that recently acquired 49% of power grid operator DEDDIE and manages assets worth €370 billion.

FS Ark, GEK Terna’s partner, is a vehicle of the Igneo group and manages funds of €14.5 billion. Ardian, which has joined the current operators of the Attica ring road, is the second biggest concession company in the world in managing road infrastructure, with assets of €120 billion and an extensive portfolio of 8,000 kilometers of roads managed in France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Brazil, and Chile.

The other participants from abroad include Abertis Infraestructuras from Spain, which manages 8,600 km of roads, Italy’s Gruppo Fininc-INC SpA, which belongs to the Turin-based Dogliani family, and the consortium of Brisa-Auto Estradas de Portugal-Rubicone Bidco; the first two are from Portugal and Rubicone Bidco is from the UK.

There is also a purely French bid by the consortium of Vauban with DIF and EGIS, the last having already secured the concession of Egnatia Odos.

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