Dubai: Nakheel will be awarding construction contracts valued at Dh7 billion this year, on top of the Dh5.3 billion it tendered last year, indicating it sees no reason to slow the pace of development activity.
“We are in a position to award construction contracts at better prices,” said Ali Rashid Lootah, Chairman of Nakheel, which reported net profits of Dh3.68 billion for 2014 on revenues of Dh7 billion. “It has had an impact on creating healthier margins for us in 2014. Since 2010, the value of construction contracts awarded by us has touched Dh24 billion.”
“The slowdown [in the market] since the second half of 2014 has not led us to drop our prices and we are still selling,” said Lootah. “Our cash collections between 2010 to 2014 totalled Dh28 billion, of which Dh10 billion came from the older customers we had, Dh11 billion from new ones and Dh7 billion from retail, leasing and other activities.”
According to Lootah, “2014 was our biggest year in terms of financial performance and achievements. Not only did we clear all Dh7.9 billion of outoutstanding bank debt four years ahead of time, we also delivered our first project — Palm Residences — since restructuring.”
