Company became largest operator of medium-sized airports and grew fourfold in five years
08/31/2022
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Wanderley Galhiego Jr. — Foto: Carol Carquejeiro/Valor
After a strong expansion cycle in recent years, Socicam is now entering a moment of internal reorganization and focusing on recently won contracts. The company, founded 50 years ago to manage bus terminals, has now become the largest operator of medium-sized airports in Brazil, with 26 terminals, 17 of which have been won since 2019.
“The company’s backlog of contracts has increased fourfold in five years,” said Wanderley Galhiego Jr., the company’s head of new business and innovation, in an interview with Valor. The company expects to reach the end of 2022 with a set of projects worth R$10.7 billion, considering the gross revenue of all contracts throughout the term of the concession.
The most recent of them is the block of airports in the North region, in Belém (Pará) and Macapá (Amapá), that the company won in the latest federal auction held about two weeks ago.
The victory in this bidding closes the current cycle of growth for Socicam, according to Mr. Galhiego. “Even with all the challenges of the pandemic, we were able to take advantage of the opportunities to grow. But now we turn inward and work. This is the time to deliver everything that is planned with quality,” he said.
Besides the North lot, in the past few years, Socicam has won a lot of 11 airports in São Paulo (led by São José do Rio Preto) and a lot of four airports in Mato Grosso. Together, those three contracts foresee investments of at least R$1.8 billion considering the values foreseen in the project studies, which will be carried out over about 30 years.
The airports’ division has already become the most important for the group, accounting for more than half of the revenues.
The development plan for the airports is individual, according to the features of each terminal, Mr. Galhiego says. The airports in Mato Grosso, for example, have a strong vein of business focused on agribusiness, but there is also potential for new tourism routes to the coast since the state is a relevant source of tourists.
However, beyond the individual opportunities, the network operation brings advantages, for example, in the dialogue with airlines and business partners, says the executive.
Socicam has also had an expansion in its land terminal segment in recent years. By 2021, the company has won two important public-private partnerships (PPPs): one to manage part of the bus terminals in the city of São Paulo and the second to operate terminals in the metropolitan region of Recife, Pernambuco. The company operates 102 terminals in total.
The group was founded in 1972 by the Freitas family, initially to manage the old Campinas Bus Station — which is the origin of the name of the company, where “Cam” stands for Campinas. The company became one of the main operators in the segment and is still responsible for the three bus terminals in the capital city of São Paulo.
*By Taís Hirata — São Paulo
Source: Valor International