09/03/2008 14h47
Companies prepare themselves for a dispute for the São Paulo highways
Valor Econômico - 09/03/2008
Since yesterday morning a little army of engineering's, technicians and financing executives of the main highway concessionaires of the country is leaned over thousands of pages of the public notices of the five São Paulo highways that will be auctioned on the 29th of October. Each of those companies is making counts, analyzing risks and seeking the magic formula that will allow them to offer the lowest price to be charged at the toll squares that will be distributed along more than 1.7 thousand kilometers of the Carvalho Pinto, Ayrton Senna, Dom Pedro I, Raposo Tavares and Marechal Rondon highways. This is the first relevant package of highways that the State of São Paulo auctions in the last 10 years. Animated by the results of the seven federal highways that were auctioned at the end of last year, and by the success of the concession process of the West part of the Rodoanel, Government decided to bet heavily on this new package. It is charging R$ 3.5 billion (US$ 2.15 billion) in granting rights - the rate that each company pays the State to have the right to explore the highways - and total investments of R$ 8 billion (US$ 4.9 billion). Besides, the winner will have to do the maintenance in nearly 900 kilometers of side roads that are not part of the concession. The government of the state of São Paulo believes that many companies got nothing in the last auctions and would be available to accept these conditions. But even with those demands, considered tough by most of the market, practically all big companies of the sector are already getting ready to take part in the fight. And probably in an aggressive way.
