Dubai: Dubai-based Al Habtoor Leighton Group is eyeing expansion into Kuwait, Oman and Libya this year shifting its focus, and sees, its order book rising 36 per cent over 12 months, an executive said.
"I think the business over the next couple of years will change for us," Laurie Voyer, the firm's chief executive and managing director, said yesterday.
"I expect in the next two or three years the surrounding Gulf countries will contribute about the same as what the UAE has done for us in the last couple of years."
Al Habtoor, an affiliate of Australia's Leighton Holding, will generate about 50 per cent of its revenues over the next two to three years from the UAE, particularly in Abu Dhabi, down from 80 per cent currently, Voyer said.
Revenues from Qatar are expected to rise to around 25 per cent from 20 per cent, with the remainder coming largely from Saudi Arabia where the firm is already operating, and opportunities in Kuwait, Bahrain and Oman, he said.
Construction firms in the UAE have been securing more work in Qatar recently to take advantage of a market which is set to grow 7 per cent to about $5.6 billion (Dh20.5 billion) in 2010, according to investment bank The First Investor.
"We are already well established in Qatar so that's probably going to be the easiest [area] for us to expand into," he said.
Al Habtoor's total order book is expected to rise to around Dh30 billion over the next 12 months from around Dh22 billion.
The firm expects to hear whether it has won a contract worth around $500 million for the Kuwait airport runway development in the next three to four weeks, Voyer said, adding it had submitted the lowest tender for the contract.
Al Habtoor hopes to be in Libya in the second half of 2010, and is "four or five weeks away" from a contract in Oman, he said declining to give details.
