CENTRAL Plant Services Company (CPS-Arabia) is focusing on raising the level of professionalism in the lifting equipment sector in the Gulf region.

The Saudi-based company, set up with the goal of becoming a premier provider of services to leading companies for overhead lifting equipment, is now looking at completing its portfolio of products and services by setting up a crane factory in Dammam.

“CPS-Arabia is a unique provider of services for fixed (overhead) lifting equipment in the petrochemical, power and water plants, and oil and gas industries in the region. Our main line of work is inspection, testing and maintenance of already installed equipment,” says CEO Yassin Al Hussain.

The company was established in Dhahran in 1999 by Al Hussain, who is no stranger to the lifting equipment industry with 15 years prior crane manufacturing experience.

Al Hussain says that being independent of any particular manufacturer enables the company to deliver impartial technical support for all brands of lifting equipment.

CPS-Arabia offers a comprehensive range of services including assessment inspections, repairs and upgrades of obsolete equipment, periodic maintenance, reliability inspection and load testing.

The company has gained wide acceptance in the Saudi market and counts leading organisations such as Saudi Electricity Company (SEC), Saudi Aramco and Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (Sabic) among its prestigious clients. Thanks to its enviable standing in the market as one of the leading companies in the industry, CPS-Arabia enjoys a good reputation with its clients.

Al Hussain admits that while there was a slight drop in business last year, this was due to the fact that some of long-term contracts were under renewal. Business in the first half of this year, however, has seen a remarkable growth of almost 70 per cent over the same period last year, he points out.

CPS-Arabia has been providing services to SEC under long-term contracts since 2003 and is the organisation’s crane maintenance contractor. Today, under global contracts worth over SR20 million ($5.3 million), the company is responsible for inspection, repair, testing and periodic maintenance of power plant cranes in both the central and eastern regions of Saudi Arabia until May and December 2014 respectively. CPS-Arabia also plans to cover the western and other regions all over the kingdom.

The company was awarded a similar long-term contract in 2010 by Saudi Aramco’s Mechanical Services Shops Department that extends until August 2013. It has now set its sights on becoming the crane maintenance contractor for the new divisions of the Saudi oil conglomerate.

Al Hussain comments that Saudi Aramco’s offshore projects have always been challenging and interesting. “A recent job involved using water bags to test the load lifting capacity of a pedestal crane sitting on an offshore drilling platform. The weight tested was just over 30,000 kg,” he says.

Other ‘blue chip’ customers include Sabic and the Petro-Rabigh Refinery Company on the Red Sea where CPS safety inspectors verify the ongoing reliability of several hundred lifting equipment items every year.

CPS-Arabia, which is in the process of becoming a global vendor for Sabic, is involved at the company’s downstream petrochemical plants in Jubail and Yanbu.  It is currently carrying out a contract for Saudi Petrochemical Company (Sadaf) – a joint venture company between Sabic and Shell Chemicals Arabia – for crane inspection, repair, testing and periodic maintenance in Jubail.

The project has been a source of pride for the company, according to Al Hussain.

He elaborates: “In June, a year or so after a downturn in our activities in Jubail, we were once again asked to return to the Sadaf plant as an in-plant lifting equipment services contractor. Two-thirds of this equipment is critical for their production of downstream chemical products, so it is an honour to again be entrusted with this responsibility.”

This contract will be completed in May 2013.

CPS-Arabia also has a SR4.5-million ($1.199 million) contract for another Sabic affiliate – Yanbu Petrochemical Company (Yanpet) – for whom the company is providing in-plant technical support for crane inspection, repair, testing and periodic maintenance in Yanbu until August 2014.

CPS-Arabia is now looking at taking its growth plans to the next level, and is in the final process of drawing up the full designs and drawings for the CPS crane factory, which will be located in Second Industrial City in Dammam. It is also focusing on netting in new contracts while attending to all the requirements of its clients on its current order book to ensure their satisfaction.

CPS-Arabia, which has a staff of 50 employees, sets high priority to proper and ongoing training for its personnel, as it firmly believes that this translates into timely delivery of services that meet agreed specification; work according to consistent and reliable standards; and conformity to customer and statutory requirements, and best practice.

“As a long-standing member of the Lifting Equipment Engineers Association (LEEA), the company has been able to benefit from the latest, internationally recognised training that LEEA provides its members personnel,” says Stanley Monsef, CPS-Arabia operations manager and co-founder.

“In fact, CPS was the first Saudi company to achieve full membership by having a sufficient number of LEEA-qualified staff and having passed a rigorous technical audit,” he adds.

Also, Al Hussain was recently elected to the UK-based LEEA board of directors.

As its work is almost always carried out inside customers’ production areas (oil, gas, power, water plants), the company has operating bases in Riyadh, Yanbu, Jubail and Rabigh in addition to its home area around Dhahran and a branch in Bahrain. “We plan to maintain the already strong ties with our customers in these locations, and expand as much as possible within these areas,” says Al Hussain.