GIP, Morgan Stanley among Brisbane port bidders - sources

SYDNEY, July 15 (Reuters) - Consortias led by Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Fund and Global Infrastructure Partners are among parties who have lodged indicative bids for Australia's state-owned Port of Brisbane, three sources familiar with the transaction said on Thursday.

Bids for the port, which is being sold as part of a A$15 billion ($13.25 billion) sale of infrastructure assets by the Queensland state government, were received on July 5, the sources said.

Newspaper reports said the asset was unlikely to sell for its book value of A$2.5 billion, with bids more likely to come in around A$1.5 billion to A$2 billion.

One of the parties was a consortium of U.S.-based investment fund Global Infrastructure Partners, state government arm Queensland Investment Corp and Macquarie Capital (MQG.AX), two sources with direct knowledge of the matter said.

Another bidding consortium include Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners, which teamed up with Australian pension fund UniSuper to also lodge a bid, the sources said, who asked not to be named because they are not authorised to speak to the media.

Australian media said a third consortium, including New Zealand infrastructure investors HRL Morrison and New Zealand utilities investor Infratil Ltd IFT.NZ also lodged a bid.

The consortia have not been allowed to sign up banks on an exclusive basis to avoid tying up funding liquidity during this first stage of the bidding said a banking source who is backing of the bidders.

A data room would open in the next week or so, and shortlisted parties would be able to conduct final due diligence in the run up to final bids, said a banking source familiar with the sale process but who was not authorised to speak to the media. The source declined to say when final bids were due. A second source said no deadline had been set for final bids.

Queensland state, a big mining region, said last year it was going to sell five assets over the next three to five years to cut debt.

A Queensland Treasury spokesman declined to comment except to say: "There is significant interest in the process."

A Macquarie spokeswoman declined to comment. Global Infrastructure Partners was not immediately available to comment. (Reporting by Michael Smith and Sharon Klyne; Editing by Valerie Lee)