AED 318 million contract signed for Sidra Tower

The new tower, owned by HE Ali Bin Khalfan Muttawa Al Dhahry, is to be built on Sheikh Zayed Road, with completion due December 2008.

It will be a mixed use development out of which 21 floors will offer superior quality serviced apartments and the remainder being offices and retail space. The project has a total budget of AED 400 million. Project Managers are ARCAN Project Management Services with APG (Architecture and Planning Group) as Consultants.

The construction contract follows an earlier signing with international operators Fraser to manage the serviced apartments. Fraser, a brand of gold-standard serviced residences with successes from London and Paris to China and Singapore, targets travelers on extended stays - anything from a week and longer.

"We wanted to match a superb location with a mix of superb facilities, so we decided to appoint Fraser, which has won numerous awards internationally for its service quality," said HE Ali Bin Khalfan Muttawa Al Dhahry when signing the Fraser contract.

"Fraser may be new in the Middle East but they have what matters most in our market; unparalleled quality and a philosophy of hospitality that is very Middle Eastern."

Fraser Suites will have 158 generously sized apartments and penthouses, which will take up the 23rd to the 44th floors of the Sidra Tower.

Zelan Contracting Co is a subsidiary of a major Malaysian development company, Zelan Group, and was sponsored into the UAE by Ali & Sons in 2005.

The Zelan Group of Companies is wholly owned company by Tronoh Consolidated Berhad, a public company listed in the Kuala Lumpur stock exchange. Its three strategic business units are involved primarily in engineering and construction, manufacturing and trading, and property development.

It has a successful track record of working with some of the world's most established Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) contractors to build power plants and infrastructure projects such as Alstom (France), Siemens (Germany), Mitsubishi (Japan) and General Electric (USA).