This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on January 25, 2018

KUALA LUMPUR: Serba Dinamik Holdings Bhd, whose current order book stands at a record RM5.5 billion, expects to secure up to RM2 billion worth of new contracts this year.

“Our target is to secure an additional 10% to 20% [of the current order book] in new contracts this year,” its group chief financial officer Syed Nazim Alsagoff told reporters on the sidelines of the two-day Invest Malaysia 2018, which ended yesterday.

This year’s order book target is higher than the RM1.5 billion target for 2017, which the group had surpassed the expectation to secure RM2.5 billion in new contracts.

While not giving specific updates on Serba Dinamik’s ongoing bids in Central Asia, Nazim said the group’s contract bidding worldwide is still largely in the core engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning and operations and maintenance services, which have seen “a relatively high renewal rate in terms of current contracts”.

The two segments contributed 86.23% and 13.09% respectively of the group’s revenue of RM1.92 billion for the nine-month period ended Sept 30, 2017.

Serba Dinamik reportedly put in 10 proposals in Central Asia — namely Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan — in 2017, with a combined project value of US$5 billion (RM19.6 billion).

On Serba Dinamik’s recent private placement to raise RM434 million for its projects in Pengerang, Johor, Nazim said at least 30% of the take-up came from new investors.

They comprise institutional and insurance funds, he added. “We have seen demand not only from local [investors] but also international requests. Local liquidity has been good and local investors have been filling up the books.”

Nazim also said Serba Dinamik is unlikely to initiate any more cash calls this year. “This [recent fundraising] will be [utilised] for the next one or two years. We still have the ability to gear up our financing. Our gearing is still relatively low at around 0.25 times,” he added.

Meanwhile, Nazim said the group is “agressively catching up” on the development of the 30mw mini hydropower plant in Kota Marudu, Sabah, after experiencing a delay since the third quarter of 2017 due to bad weather. “The weather has not been very kind of late [but] we expect to proceed with the project this quarter as and when the weather permits.”