CAIRO: Egyptian Resorts in its joint venture with Orascom Development will start construction of their Sahl Hasheesh marina in the fourth quarter of 2011, newspaper Al-Mal reported on Wednesday. The companies are looking for construction firms to complete the marina in the Sawari project on the Red Sea for a preliminary cost of around LE 2.66 billion ($444 million), the newspaper cited Egyptian Resorts Investor Relations Manager Abu Bakr Makhlouf as saying. The marina project at the Sahl Hasheesh resort has reservations totaling $20 million after the company started marketing for it last year, and cancellations due to Egypt's popular uprising have not exceeded 5 to 6 percent, he said. They companies expect to sell all the units in the project within four years. They expect revenue of $270 million from the first phase of the Marina project and will start handing units to clients in 2014, Makhlouf told the paper. Orascom Development's subsidiary Orascom Development and Management (ODM) signed a nine year agreement last year with Egyptian Resorts to develop 2.5 million square meters of Egyptian Resorts land at Sahl Hasheesh. The 42-million-square meter Sahl Hasheesh resort area, 18 km (11 miles) south of Hurghada, has a total 1,577 hotel rooms and 679 real estate units. Egyptian Resorts also said it planned to invest LE 6 billion to upgrade infrastructure such as water plants, electricity grids and a desalination project, the paper reported. Thy have already invested LE 1.2 billion on infrastructure work in the first phase of Sahl Hasheesh so far.
