ICTSI inks deal to manage Brunei's main port

MANILA, Philippines – International Container Terminal Services Inc. (ICTSI) has signed an agreement with the Brunei government to operate and maintain the Muara Container Terminal (MCT) in Brunei Darussalam for a period of four years.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange, ICTSI said the service agreement could be extended for one year at a time for a maximum of two years.

MCT is located in Muara Port, the main trade gateway for Brunei Darussalam situated at the estuary of the Brunei River about 15 kilometers from the capital, Bandar Seri Begawan.

Muara Port has a capacity of 220,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) per year and a total area of five hectares.

ICTSI recently secured a $150-million loan from seven foreign banks, namely the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd., Calyon, the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corp. Ltd., Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd., Chinatrust (Philippines) Commercial Bank Corp., Citibank NA and Mizuho Corporate Bank Ltd.

Proceeds of the loan facility will be used to refinance substantially all of the remaining outstanding balance of the company’s $250-million revolving and term loan facility due in December 2010. 

The repayment would result in ICTSI having no substantial debt repayments due until the second half of 2011.

ICTSI scaled down its capital expenditure budget for this year by half to P2.46 billion given a challenging business environment.

This year’s capex include the construction of the new Berth 6 at the Manila International Container Terminal (MICT), which would add annual capacity by about 500,000 TEUs.

For the past three years, ICTSI has invested nearly P3 billion to further expand and improve the terminal. These improvements include the installation of a central gate, expansion of the container yard, purchase of additional cargo-handling equipment, installation of additional weighing bridges and modernization of its information technology systems.

To date, ICTSI has facilities in Brazil, China, Colombia, Ecuador, Georgia, Indonesia, Madagascar, Poland and Syria.

ICTSI reported a 37.7 percent growth in net profit last year to P20.76 billion on the back of a 85.8 percent jump in net revenues.