Voltas to bid for facelift of 52 airports

Voltas, the Tata group owned engineering firm, is planning to bid for 52 airport modernisation projects including 15 international projects, over the next couple of years.

"Participation in airport modernisation is going to be a focus area for Voltas and we expect significant revenues from such projects. Internationally, Voltas has successfully participated in the Hong Kong, Bahrain and Al-Ain airport projects," said M M Miyajiwala, executive vice-president (finance), Voltas.

The company is expecting about 10 to 15 per cent revenue from airport projects alone.

Voltas is immediately looking to participate in Delhi (to be developed by GMR-Fraport) and Mumbai (GVK-South Africa) air port modernisation projects.

The Centre had recently selected these two consortiums for the development of both the airports as part of its modernisation initiative.

The tasks handled by Voltas in airport modernisation would include air-conditioning, baggage handling, public announcement systems, air-strip lighting, HVAC, electrical, plumbing and drainage systems, building automation system, fire fighting system, fire detection and suppression system, visual docking guidance system and access control systems.

The government is planning to develop greenfield airports at Hassan, Gulbarga (Karnataka) and Gangtok (Sikkim). The Centre has chalked out a Rs 6,000 crore plan to develop 35 non-metro airports in the country over the next three years. The airports will be developed in places Coochbehar, Pant Nagar, Surat, Mysore, Mangalore, Varanasi and Baramati also.

Currently, the electromechanical projects contribute to 60 per cent of the total revenue of the company. While engineering services contribute 12-14 per cent and air-conditioning and cooling brings about 28 per cent.

"Anticipating good real estate development in future in the form of buildings, shopping malls, special economic zones, IT parks and air ports, we anticipate good growth for our electromechanical division," he said.