Oman’s Transport and Communications Ministry (MOTC) has received offers from fifteen companies for a contract to upgrade the Bidbid to Sur road.

India’s Larsen & Toubro submitted the lowest bid of RO77m ($200.2m). It also submitted five alternative bids. Turkey’s Sezai Turkes-Feyzi Akkaya submitted the second lowest bid of RO78.8m. It also submitted five alternative bids. The deadline for submitting the tender was 14 January.

The road between Bidbid and Sur is a major transport link in the sultanate, connecting the capital city of Muscat to the Sharqiyah region in the north-eastern part of Oman. This is the third construction package to be tendered on the road scheme.

In February 2011, the ministry awarded a joint venture of Italy’s Astaldi and Ozkar a RO125.2m contract to build the phase 1a of the dual carriageway between Bidbid and Sur.

In August 2011, a joint venture of Turkey’s Sezai Turkes-Feyzi Akkaya (STFA) and the UAE/Australian Habtoor Leighton Group was awarded the RO117m contract for phase 1b of the road scheme.

The phase 1b contract involves upgrading a 75-kilometre stretch of road that will be expanded from the existing two-lane carriageway into a four-lane carriageway. The scope also involves building 50km of service road and nine interchanges.