Mumbai-based IRB Infrastructure Developers (IRB), has bagged the contract for the 239 km Surat-Dahisar section of the National Highway Development Project (NHDP)- Phase-V.

The Surat-Dahisar project section witnessed stiff competition since it has the highest traffic density, hence a money spinner. IRB offered a revenue share of 38% followed by L&T (35.21per cent ) and Reliance Energy (33.61 per cent) in the the Surat-Dahisar NHDP project.

With this, analysts feel that IRB's competitive bidding, pipping some of the big players, demonstrates its project management skills and in-house execution capabilities. Having bagged highway projects totalling to 414 km which constitutes nearly 8 per cent of the over 5,000-km National Highway project, IRB has also become one of the largest players in NHDP segment. It already has concession for the Mumbai-Pune Expressway (110 km) and Surat-Bharuch section (65 km).

Meanwhile, IRB's order book also doubles with the NHDP assignments which involves a capex of over Rs.25 billion. As of June 30, 2007, the company had an order book position of Rs.23.86 billion.