Egypt’s Abraj Misr has appointed the local SIAC Industrial Construction & Engineering Company to carry out the construction work on its $490m residential project in Cairo

The $140m contract is for Abraj Misr’s eco-friendly The Gate Project in Cairo’s eastern suburb of Nasr City.

The 400.000 square metre project is set to be completed within 24 months. The Gate is a luxury mixed-use development encompassing seven residential, commercial, retail, and office units with a five-star hotel.

The project is designed by Belgian architect Vincent Callebaut and is set to be an eco-friendly project powered by solar water heating and wind turbines. The buildings will have green areas and roof terraces that will have features such as an archi-green building, passive geothermal cooling, solar photocells, green walls and rooftop community gardens, according to a company statement.

US-based Hill International is the project manager.

Despite calls for more affordable housing The Gate is one of many new luxury real estate developments in east Cairo. Earlier this month Egypt’s Sixth of October Development and Investment Company (Sodic) and Heliopolis Development Housing (Heliopolis Housing) signed a co-development contract for a major mixed-use scheme in th Heliopolis area near Nasr City.

Egypt saw a total of 7,560 residential units delivered in Cairo throughout 2015, compared with the scheduled delivery of 30,000 units forecast by developers at the beginning of 2015, representing a materialisation rate of just 25 per cent, according to a report by US-based property consultancy JLL.