October 9 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria's capital Sofia has failed again to sell its tram repair company Tramcar, even though it cut the call price in the third tender for the company, the city said on Tuesday.
The Municipal Privatisation Agency called the third tender for 100% of Tramcar in July, seeking at least 25 million levs ($18 million/12.8 million euro), which was 16% below the price asked in the previous sale attempt. Interested bidders were invited to place their offers by October 2.
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Three firms had bought tender documents but none placed a bid in the third tender, a Municipal Privatisation Agency official told SeeNews. No bids were submitted in the previous two tenders, either.
"We expect a decision by the [agency's] Supervisory Board for a new tender," the official said.
The buyer should keep the core activity of the company in the next 10 years and honour Tramcar's 13.6 million euro ($18.7 million) contract with Czech trade and engineering company Inekon Group for the upgrade of 18 tram cars. Sofia hired the Czech company to refurbish its trams last year.
Tramcar reported a pre-tax profit of 41,000 levs on 4.14 million levs in revenue in 2005, the last year for which figures were available. It has an equity capital of 106,976 levs.
(1 euro = 1.95583 Bulgarian levs)