Using 30 Kiwis and 300 local workers, Downer built 150km of roading, bridges and causeway in Vanuatu - establishing a ring road around the main island of Efate, and sealing 50km on Santo Island, which has beef farming and forestry operations.
The project, backed by $75 million in Kiwi dollars of United States government money and $14 million in New Zealand aid, started in 2008 and finished five months ahead of schedule in November 2010. Downer maintained the new road, with a chip seal surface, for 12 months, and Mr Oldman said they had now been given some extra work.
He said the ring road went through a mixture of hills and low coastal plains. "Some parts were completely impassable. They were coral tracks built by the US Army in World War II.
"We had to quarry our own aggregate - some 600,000cu m - and it was a big job."
Project manager Brian Fuller and lab manager Wendy Heynen, both from Tauranga, spent most of the time in Vanuatu.
Downer featured in the research and development category for its solution to completing emergency repairs to the Cassidy International Runway on Kiritimati (Christmas) Island in the Republic of Kiribati.
The was no asphalt plant available, and Mr Oldman said Downer used "clever technology to take the product from New Zealand".
The team in Tauranga manufactured 400 tonnes of cold asphalt, containerised it, chartered a vessel and laid it on the Christmas Island runway, used as a standby airstrip for TransPacific flights between New Zealand, Australia and the west coast of the United States.
The runway was first built in 1956 by the British Army for nuclear bomb tests in the South Pacific.
Downer has now built its own asphalt plant and developed an aggregate quarry on the island.
It is just starting to completely resurface the runway - a job that will take 12 weeks using 20,000 tonnes of hot asphalt and costing $17 million of New Zealand aid money.
Triodent, which has grown its operation to 120 staff and $14.5 million revenue in eight years, has reached the International Business awards for the second time after winning the Best Use of Research and Development category in 2009.
After being named Bay of Plenty Exporter of the Year last year, Triodent now has the chance of gaining further national honours.
"It's very exciting," said Triodent founder and chief executive Simon McDonald, a qualified dentist.
"Even through the recession, we've had good growth. Last year, we increased sales in United States by 40 per cent.
"Our products have a high re-order rate. Once they buy the toolkit and they run out of the consumables, then they have to buy more.
"It's a product that sticks to them," said Dr McDonald, who is looking to take his company to $20 million this year.
Triodent now exports its dental products, featuring the V3 matrix system, to more than 60 countries but its main market is the US, which makes up half the revenue. It sells to 12,000 dentists in the US, about 10 per cent of the potential market.
Dr McDonald said Triodent would release three new products this year. The first in March and the last one in September would contain groundbreaking titanium alloy powder, developed in Tauranga.
The other finalists in the Best Business over $50 million are: BCS airport baggage handling systems, Buckley Systems, Christchurch Engine Centre, Orion Health, Rakon, Skope heating and refrigeration technologies, Tait Radio Communications and Westland Milk Products.
Other finalists in Best Business $10 million-$50 million are: Altitude Aerospace Interiors, Canary Enterprises butter products, EasiYo Products yoghurt, Les Mills International, Trilogy skincare, Vista Entertainment Solutions.
