Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company (Masdar) has received commercial bids from four groups for a contract to build its headquarters at the zero-carbon Masdar City development in Abu Dhabi.

The bidders are the local Al-Habtoor Engineering Enterprises with South Africa’s Murray & Roberts Contractors (Middle East); US-based Contrack International; Germany’s Ed Zueblin; and Japan’s Taisei Corporation.

Chicago-based Adrian Smith & Gordon Gill Architecture has designed the building as the world’s first large-scale “positive-energy” building, generating more energy than it consumes (MEED 19:8:09).

Louis Berger Group is the project manager, Environmental Systems Design is mechanical, electrical and plumbing engineer, and the structural engineer is Thornton Tomasetti, all of the US.

Designed by the UK’s Foster & Partners, the 6.5-square-kilometre Masdar City should be completed by 2016.

It will eventually grow to accommodate 1,500 businesses and 50,000 residents.