Only one bidder registered its interest yesterday for the new Philippine Orthopedic Center (POC) project, set to be the fourth PPP deal of the new program.

The consortium formed by Megawide Construction Corp. and World Citi Inc. submitted qualification documents to the Health department. Officials said the offer would be immediately evaluated and a decision issued later this month.

The proposed new hospital facility shall be located within National Kidney and Transplant Institute (NKTI) Complex on East Avenue in Quezon City. The site for development shall be provided by DOH for a period of 25 years wherein the private proponent shall undertake development & operation of the new hospital facility. The hospital shall be super-specialty tertiary care orthopedic hospital with 700-bed capacity comprising state of the art infrastructure, medical and diagnostics equipment.

The Feasibility Study was conducted by Deloitte Touche.

The others firms that showed interest in the project did not finally submit qualification documents: GE Philippines, Inc., Metro Pacific Investments Corp., Philips Electronics and Lighting Inc., Siemens Inc., Strategic Alliance Holdings, Inc., Ni-hon Sekkei, Inc./Data Trail Corp., Mount Grace Hospital Ventures and Sta. Clara International Corp.

Megawide has already bagged one PPP project, one of the Phase One segments of the PPP School Infrastructure Project (PSIP). It has also qualified to bid for phase two of the PSIP.

Since the launch in November 2010 of the PPP program, a total of three projects worth roughly P28 billion (US$678 million) have already been awarded:

• Daang Hari-SLEx link road concession
• NAIA Expressway PPP Project 
• PPP for School Infrastructure Project (PSIP)