SEOUL, KOREA - As an US$800-million project to build a new international airport in Vietnam is finally materialized, Korean companies involved in it have been given the limelight of late. The Vietnamese government officially selected on July 29 the Joinus consortium, a development company run by Korean investors, as the preferred bidder for the project to build Van Don International Airport in Quang Ninh Province in the northeast.

 

It will proceeded as a BOT (build-operate-transfer) project. Only a few weeks ago, the Joinus consortium announced it has been offered an investment of $1.1 billion from an Australia investment firm. Scheduled to be open by 2018, the airport is part of a wider program to develop the northeast including the Van Don free economic zone.

 

The Vietnamese government plans to develop the free economic zone as a center for international commerce and entertainment. Vitzrosys, a Korean company specializing in public sector ICT solutions and water treatment, is leading the consortium. The company figures that the development project will handsomely pay off in the future given the locational advantage of being close to Ha Long Bay, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the commercial prospect of the new free economic zone.