Larsen & Toubro (L&T) has received a letter of acceptance from Cochin Shipyard for engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract for a new dry dock at Cochin Port in Ernakulam district of Kerala.

The company had placed the lowest bid on a tender for the EPC contract for a dry dock – the third at the yard that went public in 2017.

The letter of acceptance to L&T has been issued on 27 April 2018.

L&T will have to submit a bank guarantee to Cochin Shipyard prior to signing a formal contract.

The company’s winning bid was around Rs one crore less than the Rs 1,799 crore estimated by the shipyard.

In 2017, Cochin Shipyard had sold shares in an initial public offering (IPO) to part-fund the Rs 2,769 crore expansion plan. It comprised constructing Rs 1,799 crore new dry dock and Rs 970 crore international ship repair facility at the Cochin Port Trust.

The company’s existing two dry docks permit building of ships up to 1,10,000 dead weight tonne and repair ships of up to 125,000 dead weight tonne.