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News in brief

01 October 2020

JGC lands $3.7bn Iraq refinery upgradation deal

JGC Corporation, a global engineering company headquartered in Japan, says it has secured a contract for the upgradation of a major refinery in the Iraqi port city of Basrah.

The engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning contract worth 400 billion Japanese yen ($3.7 billion) was awarded to the JGC group by South Refineries Company, an Iraqi entity under the Ministry of Oil.

The scope of work includes installation of fluid catalytic cracking unit with a 34,500-barrels-per-day (bpd) capacity; a vacuum distillation unit (55,000 bpd and diesel desulfurisation unit (40,000 bpd), thereby increasing production to 19,000 bpd of gasoline and 36,000 bpd of diesel fuel. The project is due for completion in 2025.

Funding for the project will be procured through Japanese ODA loans from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), and is the largest-scale reconstruction assistance from Japan since the 2003 Iraq War.

For this project, the JGC Group will be conducting skills training for more than 1,000 Iraqis and then hire 7,000 skilled Iraqi workers. This is the JGC group’s second project in Iraq. In 2013, the Japanese group was involved in a power station reconstruction project.

ASGC makes headway on Accor group’s new Dubai hotel

ASGC, one of the leading construction groups in the UAE, says work is moving at a steady pace on Accor group’s new hotel project coming up in Dubai.

The 25hours Hotel Dubai is a 434-room facility located in One Central Development by DWTC which is in the heart of the Central Business District, Dubai’s hub for finance, commerce and trade.

It is the first property outside of Europe for the German hotel brand. This hotel concept by Accor provides contemporary solutions to the cosmopolitan urban traveller’s needs.

ASGC is a vertically integrated construction group that is best known for delivering turnkey special projects in the UAE.

ASGC has grown progressively over the last three decades and has been involved in landmark projects such as City Walk, Etihad Museum, Vision Tower, JBR, The Onyx, Bay Square, Business Central Towers, Golden Mile, Nestle Factory and Waldorf Astoria.

STATS upbeat on Mideast contract wins

UK-based pipeline technology specialist STATS is expecting a steady revenue growth for 2020 despite the Covid-19 impact mainly due to its string of contract wins in the core Middle East markets of the UAE, Oman, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

The UK group’s milestone achievements in 2019 included completing a key project in Saudi Arabia utilising the company’s patented BISEP technology, establishing an operational facility in Muscat to support work with Petroleum Development Oman, and successfully delivering a technically challenging large-diameter isolation project in Qatar.

Despite the impact of low oil prices and Covid, STATS says it is confident its 2020 performance and activity levels would be broadly consistent with those of 2019. STATS says it had generated revenues of £39.1 million ($51.5 million) and Ebitda earnings of £5.6 million ($7.3 million) according to its annual accounts as of December 31, 2019.

Based in Kintore, near Aberdeen, UK, STATS’ principal activity is the provision of pressurised pipeline isolation, hot tapping and plugging services to the global oil, gas and petrochemical industries. It had also completed subsea hot tapping workscopes in the UAE and in Egypt. Towards the end of 2019, its Abu Dhabi branch moved to new larger facilities.

Drake & Scull names new CEO, finance head in big shake-up

UAE-based Drake & Scull, a regional leader in engineering and construction services, has announced a top-level executive shake-up appointing Munir Mansour as its new chief executive officer and Peter Lalor as the chief financial officer.

The move comes as the embattled Dubai firm faces incurring losses and a debt restructuring plan.

Like many construction firms, Drake & Scull had been hit by a slump in the regional building industry over the past few years. It attributed the losses mainly to cost overruns in secondary markets such as Oman, Qatar and Jordan, as well as rising debt servicing costs.

The company, which has reported losses in eight of the past 10 quarters in 2018, had engaged advisers on a new restructuring and business plan.

Mansour is a highly seasoned leader with more than four decades of experience in the industrial and contracting industry in the UAE. The new CFO, Lalor has been in the Middle East for the last 14 years and boasts significant experience in corporate strategy, finance, legal and commercial management in a variety of sectors, including infrastructure, construction, engineering and manufacturing. Previously, he was the CFO for Al Naboodah’s international businesses.