Jacobs, the infrastructure services company based in Dallas, Texas, will draw up a twenty-five-year master plan for Cochin International Airport in Kochi, in south India. Jacobs announced that Cochin International Airport Limited, the airport’s operator, appointed it for the work. Jacobs has $12 billion in annual revenue and 47,000 employees, according to the company.
The operator describes Cochin as the world’s first fully solar-powered airport. The plan will prepare it for future passenger and cargo demand, add capacity, improve operations and sustainability, and support its role as “a key gateway for tourism and economic activity across the region,” the company said. Jacobs will also build an environmental and social impact assessment framework to guide the airport’s future development.
Jacobs will lead the work from its India operations, with support from specialists in the United Kingdom. The company has worked on infrastructure and industrial development in India for more than fifty years and has more than 4,100 professionals in eight offices in the country. Its aviation work in India includes Noida International Airport, near Delhi in northern India, which Jacobs calls India’s first net-zero emissions airport.
Sinead Giblin, an executive vice president at Jacobs, said strategic aviation infrastructure “is essential to supporting regional connectivity.” Manu G, airport director at Cochin International Airport Limited, said: “The development of a 25-year master plan is a significant milestone in shaping CIAL’s long-term vision and future growth.”
Why this matters
For American executives, the contract is an example of a US company winning long-range infrastructure work in India and leading it from its own teams in the country, with specialist support from Europe. It also puts an American firm at the center of decisions on how a key tourism gateway in southwestern India grows over the next quarter century.
