Al Rushaid Group, headquartered in Al Khobar, is now the eleventh largest company in Saudi Arabia, employing more than 5,200 people worldwide. It is also the largest supplier of oilfield-related equipment and services to Saudi Aramco.
Since its foundation by Shaikh Abdullah Rasheed Al Rushaid in 1978, the Group has built its reputation on providing unrivalled expertise in oil and gas development, with its industrial and commercial services focused around this core sector.
Significant expansion continues across all five sectors with increasing growth in the trading, industrial, engineering, investment and IT and satellite communication businesses. The Group's latest investment strategy is the highly ambitious SR300 million ($ 79 million) Oil and Gas Technology Center (OTC), rapidly taking shape on a prime 300,000 sq m site on the Abqaiq road, a few kilometres away from Saudi Aramco and the Eastern Province's second industrial city.
A new industrial city in its own right, the OTC is the first such oil and gas facility of its kind in the Middle East and includes full Internet provision, more than 500 phone lines and direct electrical supply from the national grid to power the manufacturing industries.
According to a company spokesman, up to 75 per cent of the business will come from the oil and gas sector, with the OTC facility set to play a major role in serving future hydrocarbon developments in the Kingdom.
With the increasing demand for energy, Saudi Arabia is looking for more non-associated natural gas to meet the feedstock requirements for desalination and power plants, petrochemical plants, and a new wave of world-scale plants and industrial projects.
As well as serving Saudi Aramco, OTC will also provide support to subcontractors and other petroleum industry players involved in developing free-standing gas reserves. The exploration and development of these vast gas reserves is necessary and there will be increasing need on a local basis for sophisticated manufacturing, service and repair facilities to meet upstream technological requirements.
OTC facilities will include repair and service workshops for recycling oil rig equipment, both locally and on site with significant cost savings for the petroleum sector. The facilities will have both manufacturing and repair services housed under one roof.
Al Rushaid Group sees combined specialised services all going to the wellhead as the way forward, meeting operational demands for the oil majors and contractors in the field in terms of repairs, spare part services and drilling equipment. Such services are set to become increasingly important, not only in the petroleum sector but within the petrochemical and industrial sectors in the future.
Al Rushaid Group is spearheading this ambitious expansion programme at an accelerated rate and expects everything to be ready by the end of next year. Eventually, the centre will house five of his leading joint ventures, with Cameron Al Rushaid already commissioned and others due for completion by the end of this year.
Al Rushaid Group has been instrumental in bringing many of the world's leading companies into the Kingdom, harnessing advanced technologies from many of the world's leading petroleum engineering companies and providing a diverse range of manufacturing and service-related joint ventures. These 12 joint ventures include Cameron, Dresser Rand, Cooper Oil Tools, Foster Wheeler, Baker Hughes, Weatherford and Halliburton.
Al Rushaid Group is now the leading shareholder in the international Foster Wheeler Group and Cleveland Bridge, the engineering and structural steel company, is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Al Rushaid Group. With its sister company Dorman Long, Cleveland Bridge is building the landmark Shaikh Khalifa Bridge in Bahrain and contracted to build the Shaikh Zayed Bridge in the UAE. Cleveland Bridge also provided structural steel for the Burj Al Arab and Emirates Tower projects in Dubai.
The petroleum industry demands world-class products and services on a continuous basis and from the outset Al Rushaid Group has developed the expertise to meet these demands locally.
Included in the Group's industrial areas are Arabian Minerals and Chemical Fluids Company, a joint venture (jv) with Smith/Schlumberger Drilling Fluids; Arabian Rockbits and Drilling Tools, a jv with Halliburton Rockbits and Drilling Equipment; Dresser Al Rushaid Valve and Instrumentation, a jv with Dresser Inc; Baker Atlas Arabia Ltd., a jv with Baker Hughes for wireline services; Weatherford Al Rushaid Ltd., a jv with Weatherford Inc. for non-weld and positive centralisers and stop collars: Arabian Point Eight Power Ltd, a jv with Point Eight Power Inc. for switchgear; Saudi Shoe Company, a jv with Wolverine Inc., for safety and military footwear; and Cameron Al Rushaid, a jv with Cameron Corporation for control equipment for the oil and gas industry.
