Norizan Ahmad

Cost-Related Issues in Malaysian Construction Contracts

Time, cost, and quality are the three main challenges of the construction industry. This research chapter focuses on the different contractual obligations between the Public Works Department (PWD) standard form of contract and Persatuan Arkitek Malaysia (PAM)’s form of contract. Comparative studies of the cost-related clauses (the PAM and PWD Contract, With Quantities) have been carried out. The research aimed to investigate the cost-related issues faced by the construction parties by focusing on the applications and principles applied by the courts for disputes brought to courts by the suffering parties. This chapter deduces important lessons that must be fulfilled to avoid and minimise the cost-related disputes in the construction industry.

Sources of Financing for Public Private Partnership Projects: Lesson Learnt from Malaysia

Objectives: In Malaysia, under the Public Private Partnership (PPP/PFI) financing arrangement, the private company has to secure large project funding for the development of public infrastructure projects. The reasons are due to the unfavorable financial market conditions, lack available banks offering long-term financing, less attractive lending terms, and higher interest rates could hinder the private company to obtain capital funding. This paper aims to investigate sources of financing for PPP/PFI projects in Malaysia and to identify barriers involved in the PPP/PFI financing. Method: A qualitative method of data collection was employed. A semi-structured interview has been conducted among the three key players involved in the PPP/PFI projects: bank, public authority and private company resulted of 22 participants from 16 PPP/PFI projects in Malaysia. A computer aided qualitative data analysis software ALTAS.ti was used for data analysis. Findings: The findings revealed that most of the Malaysian PPP/PFI infrastructure projects are associated with high project cost amounting up to RM6 billion and the debt-equity ratios are in the range of 80:20 and 90:10. This demand the private company to restructure the PPP/PFI project financing through a combination of few sources, debts (i.e., Sukuk, bond, syndicated term loan, and government support loan) and shareholders’ equity. Furthermore, the financing constraints are affected due to the complexity in credit assessment, high financing costs and limited suitable financing facilities. Improvements: For future research, the viability of the PPP/PFI projects and the strength of the private company are inevitable to secure good financing from respective banks. A framework of ‘securing project finance for PPP/PFI projects in Malaysia’ will be developed in detail consisting of four components: sources of financing; critical factors; securing financing strategy and success securing finance. It is believed that the framework could assist private construction company in obtain financing for their future infrastructure projects.

Review on the study of green design performance for building refurbishment project: Finding the gaps in knowledge

This paper aims to find the gaps in knowledge in the study of green design performance for refurbishment projectsduring design process in the Malaysian construction industry. This includes critical review and analysis of findings by other well known researchers on the need to establish the theoretical frameworks of green design performance in refurbishment project. Literature review found that project characteristics and design team attributes are the variables. The literature review forms the basis for findings the gap in knowledge that is useful for authors to further research in this area of study.The paper concludes with the discussions on how each variables correlate with another variables which eventually formed the theoretical framework and hyphotesis.

Assessing important qualities of the design team in managing client's brief

Development of sufficient brief is crucial to ensure successful achievement of expected outcomes of construction projects. The client is responsible for delivering required information during briefing. However, their lack of knowledge and experience is a barrier to active involvement during briefing. The paper presents the findings of the questionnaire survey of 104 consultant architects on the importance of clients participation during the briefing process and highlights the qualities of the design team as pre-requisites for improving the attributes of clients during briefing. In this study, the design team includes architects, engineers and quantity surveyors. Five related variables tested were found significant to influence client attributes. These are experience, competency, commitment, ability to understand the client and teamwork within the design team. These key qualities facilitate the design team in understanding the client and fostering teamwork which leads to consequential enhancement of brief development.