Manila Water Company, a member of the Ayala Group of companies, is planning to submit scaled-up proposals in the third quarter of 2017 for prospective water concessions in Myanmar and Indonesia following the success of its pilot projects.
In a press briefing after the firm’s annual stockholders’ meeting, MWC Chief Operating Officer for New Business Operations Virgilio Rivera Jr. said these proposals will be for Yangon City in Myanmar and Bandung City in Indonesia.
Rivera said they have just submitted their report for the successful pilot project to drastically reduce the non-revenue water in Yangon and expect to complete a similar pilot project in Bandung City, the capital of West Java.
“With the completion of these pilot projects, we have shown them our best practices and are now ready to propose a scaled-up version,” said Rivera.
MWC’s newly named President and Chief Executive Officer Ferdinand de la Cruz said they are even ready to take on much bigger projects in these cities to the extent of a full-scale water concession like what they have in the East Service Zone of Metro Manila.
De la Cruz said MWC’s expansion into countries in Southeast Asia will contribute to their goal of achieving a net income of P11.5 billion by 2020 and that half of this should come from businesses other than its Metro Manila Concession.
Rivera said they intend to do more pilot projects in other parts of the Philippines and Southeast Asia noting that local government units and water districts will be more receptive to tapping MWC once the company has demonstrated its expertise.
In the case of Yangon, MWC partnered with Mitsubishi Corporation to adopt two district metering areas located in South Okkalapa and Insein townships. By the end of 2016, non-revenue levels in both townships improved to 14 percent from the original 54 percent.
For Bandung, Indonesia’s fourth largest city with its third largest population of P2.4 million, MWC has reduced NRW from a high of 59 percent in September, 2016 to 23 percent in just three months.
Rivera said MWC will also focus on growing its business through B2B, by offering property developers their pipe-laying expertise or for the outsourcing of their water facilities for residential projects as well as industrial parks.
Aside from sister company Ayala Land, Inc., Rivera said they have also been tapped by SM Development Corporation for 5 residential projects and will be signing up for 5 more by early next year.
MWC Chief Finance Officer Luis Juan Oreta said capital expenditures this year will be much larger than the P8.7 billion they spent in 2016 although the exact amount will depend on the acquisition of new projects.
Source: The Nation’s Leading Newspaper
