No capital outlay from Naim

KUCHING: Naim Holdings Bhd (Naim) will not have to come up with any capital outlay in the implemention of the RM2.5bil Sabah oil and gas terminal project.

Managing director Datuk Hasmi Hasnan said the project, a joint venture (JV) between South Korea's Samsung Engineering Co and Naim, was implemented under an alliance concept where the JV partners were not allowed to carry out any construction work.
Hasmi says Naim will continue to focus on property development over the next ten years.

“The work will be sub-contracted out. Naim and Samsung Engineering are mainly involved in project management,” Hasmi said in reply to a query raised by the Minority Shareholders Watchdog Group (MSWG) at its AGM here yesterday. Naim, which has a 10% stake in the JV,will be paid a fee in managing the project, according to Hasmi.

The un-incorporated Samsung-Naim JV was awarded the contract by Petronas Carigali Sdn Bhd in September last year. Petronas, Samsung and Naim are members of the alliance team to jointly manage the project.

He said as the project required a high level of technical expertise, Naim was playing a supporting role to Samsung (technology provider), and that it hoped to gain a substantial degree of technology transfer which would help in any future project.

The project involves the construction of an oil and gas distribution terminal at Kimanis,which is expected to yield 300,000 barrels of oil and 1.25 billion cu ft of natural gas per day. The terminal, which is scheduled for completion by late 2013,will receive crude oil from offshore Sabah, where it will be processed and distributed via a proposed 500km on-shore gas line linking Sabah and Bintulu in Sarawak.

Hasmi said the project was progressing well, and that 80% of Stage One works were expected to be completed by the end of next year.

“The piling and foundation work for the proposed processing plant and storage facilities are now underway,” he told StarBizWeek.

Responding to another query from MSWG, Hasmi said Naim would continue to make property development its main thrust over the next 10 years.

The group has a landbank of some 1,000ha with an estimated gross development value (GDV) of RM6bil. Hasmi said the group was now in talks with both potential domestic and international parties to jointly invest in two proposed massive mixed development projects in Batu Lintang, Kuching and Bintulu. The proposed Batu Lintang project covers 13.6ha and will consist of two office towers, a shopping mall, condominiums, a hotel, a water theme park, a showroom and multi-storey car parks.

The proposed Bintulu project will involve the development of 14.6ha land at the old airport. Naim has obtained approval from the authorities for a mixed commercial, retail, hotel and residential development there.

“Currently,these two projects are at the final planning stage. Each project has an estimated GDV of RM1.5bil,” said Hasmi.

Naim, Sarawak's largest property developer, has built some 17,000 residential and commercial units.

For the financial year ended Dec 31,2010, Naim recorded a group pre-tax profit of RM132mil on turnover of nearly RM613mil, compared with RM115.5mil and RM567mil respectively in 2009.