Kuwait Oil Company (KOC) has awarded a $385m contract to South Korea’s SK Engineering & Construction to build elevated electrical substations at oil fields in the southeast of Kuwait.

SK was selected despite submitting the second lowest bid for the engineering procurement and construction (EPC) contract, with fellow South Korean Hyundai Engineering & Construction making the lowest offer of $274m in May.

SK will work with local contractor Sayed Hamid Behbehani & Sons Company on the project, which is expected to be completed by the second quarter of 2014.

Other international contractors bidding for the contract included Athens-based Consolidated Contractors Company (CCC), Italy’s Saipem and South Korean group GS Engineering & Construction.

UK-based engineering group Amec won the front-end engineering design (feed) and project management consultancy (PMC) contracts for the project.