The University of Macau’s (UM) new campus in Hengqin is expected to cost approximately 6.1 billion yuan (US$872.84 million), according to new data from the Public Assets Supervision and Administration Bureau (also identified by its Portuguese abbreviation GPSAP).
Unlike UM’s current main Hengqin campus, the new school will form part of the SAR government’s proposed tertiary institution cluster known as the Macau-Hengqin International Education (University) Town. Other universities that are also set to establish campuses in the area include Macao Polytechnic University (MPU) and Macao University of Tourism (UTM).
As the first school to be built for the Macau-Hengqin University Town initiative, the new UM Hengqin campus project is being coordinated by the Guangdong Hengqin UM Higher Education Development Company, a public firm established by UM in 2024 to oversee the university’s expansion into Hengqin.
GPSAP data indicates that the UM-affiliated company awarded the construction tender for the new campus’s northern section to China Construction Engineering (Macau) Company and China Overseas Construction Company for a sum of 3.75 billion yuan (US$536.58 million).
Meanwhile, the bid for the construction of the school’s southern section was won by Jiantai Construction Company and Ming Shun Construction for a total of 2.08 billion yuan (US$297.63 million).
[See more: Over 80 percent of Macao youths are open to working in Hengqin, survey finds]
As for the supervision of the construction projects, the Guangdong Pearl River Consulting Group has been put in charge of overseeing the building of the campus’s northern district for 34.54 million yuan (US$4.94 million).
Supervision of the southern district’s construction has been delegated to the Shanghai Construction Engineering Supervision Consulting Company, which was awarded the tender for 17 million yuan (US$2.43 million)
Other expenses include project management, which has been assigned to AECOM Design & Consulting (Shenzhen) and AECOM (Macao) for 37.86 million yuan (US$5.42 million).
As well, the tender for architectural design and planning services went to the Architectural Design & Research Institute of South China University for 153.78 million yuan (US$22 million), with cost control service from Rider Levett Bucknall Construction Consultants (Beijing) totalling 35.88 million yuan (US$5.13 million).
Construction of UM’s new Hengqin campus kicked off last month, with the school set to be partially open in 2028, followed by a full inauguration in 2029.
Covering an area of around 375,600 square metres, the campus will comprise the Faculty of Medicine, the Faculty of Information Science and Computing, the Faculty of Engineering, and the Faculty of Design.
It will also feature a range of facilities, including a central teaching building, a sports complex, residential areas for teachers and students, as well as an international exchange centre.
