BIZ BUZZ: Saavedra targets high-impact projects
The group led by engineer Edgar Saavedra has gone a long way since bringing Megawide Construction Corp. to public hands in 2011. At that time, these boys were in their late 30s, fighting their way into the big leagues.
From construction, they diversified into infrastructure, beating bigger players when they won the Mactan-Cebu International Airport concession (in partnership with GMR) in 2014. They exited this business in 2024, but they have diversified into transportation, public market, renewable energy and real estate businesses over the years.
The group has since then listed two other companies, the first renewable energy-themed real estate trust Citicore Energy REIT Corp. in 2022 and pure-play solar developer Citicore Renewable Energy Corp. in 2024.
They also plan to list their fourth company, real estate arm PH1 World Developers Inc., in the foreseeable future. Recently, Megawide’s affordable housing program got a boost from a P10-billion investment from state-run Pag-Ibig Fund.
Now that Saavedra is in his 50s, he said he would like to focus more on high-impact projects.
“If there’s nation-building component, we’re okay with that, even if [the returns are] single digit and margin is small, as long as the volume is big,” he told media and analysts in a thanksgiving party on Friday night.
This 2026 will be an exciting time for Megawide, he said, with 1 gigawatt (GW) of renewable energy capacity—their proof of concept—coming to reality in the next three months. After that, Saavedra said their 4-GW target won’t be too far-fetched.
Citicore president Oliver Tan added that the goal is to energize 3GW by the end of this year.
“This year is going to be banner year for both Megawide and Citicore,” Tan said.
“We are the group who believes in renewable energy and we know we can convert, maybe not 100 percent (of Philippine generation capacity), and that we can be a major player,” Saavedra said.
He is equally bullish on mass housing.
“In construction, this is a good time. We were able to convince Pag-IBIG to believe in a Filipino can deliver world-class housing that’s like HDB,” he said, referring to Singapore’s public housing authority Housing & Development Board that builds most of the city-state’s affordable residential communities.
“As engineers, we want to impart knowledge, whether in school building, housing, infrastructure,” Saavedra said.
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