CAIRO: Hill International and Talaat Moustafa Group announced last week the formation of a joint venture, Hill TMG, which will oversee the construction of nine major Talaat Moustafa projects. It s a special make of company, said Waleed Abd El Fattah, vice president for special alliances at TMG, It s meant to serve TMG, but it is not exclusive to TMG. This represents a major pick-up for Hill International, a construction management company that is already deeply involved in many of Egypt s most significant building projects. The projects have a cumulative value of $3.8 billion and are expected to bring $96 million to the new Hill-TMG cooperative venture. Hill is already busy working on a number of projects unrelated to TMG, including Sama Bay, developments in Sixth of October City and a renovation of the Cairo Stadium complex. Hill s ambitious undertaking includes work on a number of TMG hotel projects. It will take on the expansion of the Four Seasons Sharm El-Sheikh, doubling the number of guest rooms and adding a golf course. Hill will also begin work on a new Four Seasons in Luxor, which is set to have around 250 rooms and 10 villas. It will also undertake a complete structural renovation of the Nile Hotel in Cairo. Hill also plans to take over construction for the 180-room Madinaty Four Seasons Golf Resort as well as the 45-hole Madinaty golf course complex. TMG has further contracted Hill to take charge of some of its larger residential developments and resorts, including the 3.4 million square meter Marsa Alam resort and the 2.93 million square meter Riyadh-based Nessamat El-Rihab residential complex. Other projects include construction of the Madinaty Open Air Mall, which will serve as Madinaty s shopping hub, and a new 30-floor office and hotel complex for TMG in Cairo. Working out the details of this expansive partnership took time, however, around six to eight months, said Abd El Fattah. While Hill-TMG will come in at the ground floor for some of these projects, TMG is also bringing the company in to work on others that are already in progress. Intimating that TMG may not have been totally pleased with the direction of some of its projects, Abd El Fattah said, They want to tie up the TMG name with quality. The Hill International office in Cairo developed out of an office owned and operated by James Knowles, which Hill has since bought. It serves as the regional office for North Africa and is also involved with projects in Libya and Morocco. Hill has entered a dynamic phase of its Middle East expansion. With other offices in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Qatar and Bahrain, Hill has been looking constantly to expand and diversify. While the Hill-TMG joint venture represents one such effort, Hill has also made a foray into the petroleum industry. It has partnered with Egaz and Gasco to pursue major petroleum-based construction projects to be undertaken in the coming years. Echoing a sentiment already in evidence by Hill s abundance of new projects, Abd El Fattah said, We are looking to the market and we are looking to grow.
