HCMC - Atkins is looking for more opportunities to participate in projects in infrastructure and other areas in Vietnam after the global design, engineering and project management firm has involved in a number of hotel and commercial projects in this country.

Alex Winchester, regional business development and commercial director of Atkins for Asia Pacific, said the company expected the chance to plan, design and enable projects in Vietnam, as the country was in dire need to speed up infrastructure development, including metro and urban rail projects in HCMC and Hanoi as well as new airports around the country.

“We will look at all the opportunities that are on for tender… We are exploring, discussing with people how we can assist whether it is a metro or the new airport,” Winchester said.

Winchester told the Daily about the chance for Atkins to join the major infrastructure projects underway in Vietnam, including the big-ticket Long Thanh airport project in Dong Nai, before he left Vietnam on Thursday after a business trip.

Winchester told reporters that Atkins had discussed with HCMC’s relevant authorities about metro development and the feedback was that they were keen on the expertise and others that the company was able to offer. He emphasized the company would continue discussion with the city on this topic.

“We need to learn the best work that the authorities here want. We need to understand what is the best way for us to work in order to realize their expectations,” Winchester said and added that doing something critical for the first time like the metro required much time.

HCMC is making every effort to develop metro lines with combined investment capital of billions of U.S. dollars in order to ease traffic pressure in this economic hub of Vietnam and to increase the transport capacity of public means, which now meet less than 10% of the demand. 

Winchester noted it was not easy to build a metro line in a heavily-populated urban area in general, especially where there are historical buildings when having to ensure construction to progress while traffic flow still went. Therefore, the experience and know-how of global companies will help much in this case.

Given Vietnam’s growth and its infrastructure development, Winchester said Atkins had placed Vietnam in its list of three new key markets in Asia Pacific. The others are Malaysia and Singapore.

Atkins is also eyeing other promising markets of the region, including Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Myanmar. “But, that’s later. So, Vietnam is our first selection for our business development,” Winchester said.

Atkins has opened an office in Vietnam. Winchester said Atkins had worked on the concept designs for a number of projects in Vietnam, including Vung Ro Bay master plan and hotels in HCMC and Nha Trang.

“All the projects are at the concept stage. As we spoke earlier that learning how to work in a new country means learning about the time, from one stage to another,” Winchester said.