The original November deadline for submissions was pushed back to January 15 after more than 60% of firms requested additional time to compile their submissions. More than 700 companies attended a briefing session on the project in July.
“The findings from the RFI evaluation will be presented to the Ministry of Transport and the cabinet for deliberation,” says MyHSR chairman, Mr Haji Fauzi Bin Abdul Rahman.
“If the response is positive, we will move on to the second phase with the Request for Proposals (RFP) stage to obtain detailed proposals from the selected consortia.”
The project to construct the planned 350km/h high-speed line between Kuala Lumpur and Singapore, which aims to offer a 1h 30min journey time, is expected to cost Ringgits 100bn ($US 21bn).
A similar scheme first proposed in 2013 and agreed between the Malaysian and Singaporean governments was dropped by the Malaysian government in January 2021 due to cost concerns. The subsequent administration decided to revive the project, but with an emphasis on private rather than state financing.
Sources from the Japanese companies were reported as believing that the project was too great a risk without financial support from the Malaysian government.
