SSI’s Project Finance & Development Unit (PFDU) fulfills several key functions from project to project. The unit is responsible for promoting, developing and co-ordinating Public Private Partnerships (PPP) and other major infrastructure projects that assimilate several engineering disciplines across the group. In projects like this, the PFDU can provide clients with a single contact point as a transaction advisor, a technical advisor to lenders, a participant in bidding consortia, developer of procurement strategies or a contract administrator.
The PFDU’s focus is on project with a non-traditional approach to procurement, generally involving mobilising private sector funding for provision of public infrastructure and services and applying integrated delivery processes, such as design-build-operate.
In all its activities, the PFDU draws upon SSI’s extensive and specialised expertise in the areas of transportation, water, power, mining and industry (buildings, electrical and mechanical), providing a solid base for involvement in project finance and development.
The unit’s focus is firmly aligned with that of SSI’s international partner, the DHV Group, one of Europe’s largest consulting engineering companies, through which SSI provides its clients with access to a broad range of international expertise and experience.
SSI has also established an extensive network of alliances and associations with leading organisations providing financial, legal and environmental advisory services in the PPP project environment.
PROJECTS
Private Sector Participation in Airport Infrastructure and Services in Kenya
An SSI team of seven experts in the fields of aviation, institutional and regulatory aspects, finance, law, and airport engineering was appointed by the World Bank to investigate the opportunities and modalities for Private Sector Participation (PSP) in the aviation sector in Kenya. The terms of the appointment were to make recommendations on an appropriate institutional, management and financing structure and PSP options, to build consensus on the preferred options with stakeholders, to prepare Terms of Reference for a Transaction Advisor, and manage the Transaction Advisor procurement process. Other aviation projects include advisory services to bidding consortia for airport concessions in India and Nigeria, and the design-construct-maintain contract for the proposed King Shaka International Airport.
Peter Glass, a civil engineer with a Masters degree in Transportation Engineering, has headed the Project Finance and Development Unit since its inception. His involvement in the field started in 1990 with an appointment by National Roads to develop an innovative contract structure for a toll road on the Warmbaths to Pietersburg section of the N1. A requirement was that the structure should mobilise private sector finance and transfer risk, while remaining within the constraints of the then current legislation. This project, completed in 1997, is acknowledged as the forerunner of the subsequent series of successful toll road concessions in SA. Peter’s focus is on projects with a non-traditional approach to procurement, generally incorporating limited recourse funding by the private sector, and the application of integrated delivery processes, such as design-build-operate. His project record over the last fifteen years covers a wide variety of roles (developer, advisor to public sector clients and lenders, bid manager, contract administrator, compliance auditor) on projects in a number of sectors (road, rail, aviation, harbours, prisons, schools, municipal infrastructure), both in SA and internationally.
