Now, the former Odebrecht will have OEC, a company dedicated to the civil construction sector, as its core business
A year and a half ago, the Odebrecht group, founded by Norberto Odebrecht, had its name changed to Novonor, in order to distance the company from the controversies related to Operation Lava Jato, which caused the beginning of its decline. Now, the company, which still has the same owners, has changed its entire leadership and is seeking a way out of the judicial recovery process, whose debts exceed R$ 100 billion.
According to the company's new command, the scenario is favorable to a resumption, although it is very far from the parameters prior to the corruption scandals. The president of Novonor, Hector Nuñez, took over the post in March and says that, when he arrived, the path was already paved, with the judicial recovery homologated and the leniency agreements concluded, so that it was possible to leave and think about the future .
Nuñez also declares that the company fulfilled its duty in terms of governance, in addition to having dedicated itself to the structuring of compliance processes.
The impacts of Lava Jato caused Novonor to stop employing almost 130 employees and now have just 30. According to the company, the recession faced by Brazil since 2015 has also had consequences for its business.
Under this bias, Maurício Cruz Lopes, president of OEC (the new brand of the former Odebrecht Engineering and Construction), explains that the construction goes through several cycles, be they ups or downs.
OEC will take the place of the petrochemical company Braskem, which is for sale
The OEC will replace the Braskem petrochemicals, now becoming Novonor's core business. The company's construction arm had revenues of US$ 500 million last year, which is far from the US$ 10 billion raised at the beginning of the last decade. However, Lopes defends that there is a trend of growth, with the expectation of earnings this year from US$ 1,1 billion to US$ 1,2 billion.
Hector Nuñez points out that the OEC no longer has the objective of becoming the largest construction company in Brazil, nor of competing for concession contracts, which require billionaire investments both for construction and in grant amounts for the government.
Currently, the company intends to operate only as a partner of winning companies in the field of civil construction. It has 22 projects underway, the largest of which is the Laúca hydroelectric power plant, in Angola. In Brazil, in turn, there are 11 works, such as Prosub, a nuclear submarine program, and the Babitonga gas terminal, in Santa Catarina.
The civil construction sector lives in a context that is very different from that experienced ten years ago. During this period, the share of infrastructure in the country's GDP fell by 50%. However, according to the coordinator of construction projects at FGV Ibre, Ana Castelo, there is hope for an improvement in this scenario over the next few years, in view of the new concessions from the federal government.
Castelo also sees the possibility that Novonor will benefit from this market, even if its image recovery is far from complete. She adds that the company will have a lot of work to do, and it needs to show that its rules are transparent and that its compliance system is strong.
Novonor opens process for the sale of a series of companies to enable their judicial recovery
In this sense, it is crucial that the company pay the creditors of the judicial recovery. Only in this way, the former Odebrecht will again have more lines of credit, although its president denies problems in obtaining financing.
Thus, to settle its debts, Novonor will have to sell several of its companies. Braskem, for example, whose value is equivalent to R$ 30 billion, should go out of business through the Exchange, during the following months.
Ocyan, an oil and gas company, and OTP, responsible for bringing together Novonor's road concessions, have also already hired banks to start looking for buyers. In addition, the group has already sold Odebrecht Ambiental and Atvos (formerly Odebrecht Agroindustrial).
Despite all the planning aimed at the evolution of the company, Novonor still faces obstacles related to its past. There is, for example, the payment of the leniency agreement signed in 2018, in the amount of BRL 2,7 billion.
This is the largest agreement between the civil construction companies involved in Lava Jato. So far, around R$150 million have been paid, that is, 5,5% of the total fine.
Finally, Nuñes points out that the disputes involving the Odebrecht family, which controls Novonor, and the operation of the business have been resolved, and no longer have any influence on the company's daily life.
