In 1982, a consortium consisting of Kristian Jebsens Rederi, BMV and Lau Eide made a proposal to borrow money privately abroad and hire Ishikawajima-Harima Heavy Industries of Japan to build the bridge. The proposal was rejected by the Public Roads Administration, who wanted to have an open tender to build the bridge, and wanted the project organized as a regular road construction administrated by themselves. The Public Roads Administration continued to work with a model which involved a foreign loan, but eventually failed to receive permission from the Ministry of Finance. Instead the toll company started negotiating with domestic banks, and in September 1984 the company agreed to borrow up to 600 million 1983-NOK and 1.2 billion 1991-NOK, without public guarantees, from Den norske Creditbank (DnC) and Nevi.