BIC December 2014 - ENTREC profile

Rising Up: ENTREC Corporation Continues to Raise its Game ENTREC’s impressive track record of rapid growth provides a solid base for a strong and purposeful acceleration into the crane market

W

By Nerissa McNaughton

ho is ENTREC? The company, built on a combination of acquisitions and organic growth, dates back to 1995 with the formation of Schell Equipment. In 2009 a public capital pool company called EIS Capital was formed. Heading the management team were the former executives of Eveready Inc.: executive chairman Ron Marlin, former CEO of Eveready Inc. and the founder/president of Marlin Travel Group; president and CEO John Stevens, former VP and CFO of Eveready Inc. and the former president, CEO and COO of NC Services Group; and CFO Jason Vandenberg, former vice president finance and CFO of Eveready Inc., and former vice president finance of Afexa Life Sciences Inc. In May 2011, EIS Capital acquired non-core heavy hauling assets from Flint Energy Services. At this time the EIS Capital name changed to ENTREC, which stands for energy, transportation, rigging, engineering and cranes.

After the Flint Energy Services acquisition, ENTREC expanded rapidly. Thirteen more acquisitions worth over $200 million followed as ENTREC looked to aggressively expand both geographically and in operational scale. Currently, ENTREC services the oilsands and liquefied natural gas (LNG) industries in Western Canada, along with the Bakken oilfield in North Dakota. Other industries serviced include conventional oil and gas, mining, petrochemical, pulp and paper, infrastructure, refining and power generation.

The rapid trajectory of ENTREC’s earnings speak to the management of the company, the assets and the confidence of the stakeholders. In just one year (December 31, 2012 to December 31, 2013) revenue increased from $132,491,000 to $212,911,000. During this time period ENTREC’s asset value grew from $265,369,000 to $359,787,000 and shareholders’ equity rose impressively from $115,992,000 to $179,768,000.

www.entrec.com

79

Regardless of how quickly ENTREC grows (and the rate of growth is truly astounding) or how successful the company becomes, the corporation is quick to credit their valued employees, from administration to engineering and logistics, as critical components in their success. For ENTREC, employee ownership is a mandate that gives each worker a vested interest in the company and allows the employees to share in the benefits of the corporation’s success. The company’s core values ensure employees are guaranteed a safe working environment where they will be motivated, engaged and respected.

Through additional core values, the company further pledges exceptional customer service that exceeds the needs of each client, integrity in every transaction and improvement of the communities and environments in which they operate.

Clearly ENTREC has reached a high point of growth, customer service and employee satisfaction – but they are just getting started.

“Each acquisition, along with the rapid organic growth, was a stepping-stone and laid the foundation for our overall goal: to enter the crane business in a serious and impactful way,” says John Stevens, president, CEO and director of ENTREC. “We will become Western Canada’s number one crane business because of engaged employees delivering excellent customer service and doing it safely; and we will remain in that number one position because we will never deviate from our core values and our commitment to our communities and the environment.”

In an open shareholders’ letter (2013) Stevens noted a very significant development ENTREC undertook in support of their goal. “The year’s most important event was our acquisition in July, 2013, of GT’s Crane and Transportation Services Inc. GT’s was based in Grande Prairie and had approximately $53 million in annual revenue, recently built state-of-the-art equipment, including 45 cranes, and had a well-designed facility under construction. The acquisition was valued at approximately $54 million in cash and shares and made ENTREC the leading crane services and heavy haul provider in northeast B.C. and northwest Alberta.”

Can they sustain their momentum as they increase their market share in the crane industry? Of course they

John Stevens

can. ENTREC’s growth is the result of careful and calculated planning; the future has not been left to chance.

“We had a strategy,” Stevens explains. “We wanted into the crane business and also wanted to grow geographically. This means we had to get into the oilsands.

We did acquisitions in Fort McMurray and Bonnyville, as well as acquisitions that got us into all of the major oil and gas producing centres: the Bakken region, northern B.C., northwest Alberta, and more.”

Evidence of this strategy is displayed in Stevens’ beautiful office, which resides on the third floor of ENTREC’s stunning new 100,000-plus-square-foot headquarters on the western edge of Acheson. From his floor-toceiling windows Stevens can see over 60,000 cars go by daily on the Yellowhead Highway. The hutch on his desk is topped by a long line of baseball caps; each one is

www.entrec.com

from a company ENTREC acquired and they are lined up in the order the acquisitions took place.

After having entered the crane business in 2012, ENTREC quickly grew its fleet to 165 in 2013. Its ongoing commitment to becoming the premier crane service provider in Western Canada is perhaps best illustrated by its current comparative fleet count – which now stands at 245.

“We are well positioned to take care of the oilsands industry,” says Stevens, pointing out the importance of allterrain cranes in the oilsands, especially for MRO work. “The maintenance work is certainly there and ongoing. We are prepared to take full advantage of the growth of in situ.

“ENTREC is very well positioned to serve the industry’s growth because of the major capital investments we’ve made to the oilsands,” Stevens continues. “We have developed a new yard with a large shop well under construction, on the south side of Fort McMurray, and are committing more and more equipment to that operation each month. We also have another new, large facility with a significant amount of equipment in Bonnyville, which is in the heart of the busy in-situ and heavy oil country to the south.

“Our Calgary location serves the local market and notably also has significant experience in handling U.S./ Canadian cross-border traffic, a significant traffic stream which is steadily increasing as it relates to oilsandsbound infrastructure. We’ve also invested in supporting our customer not only in the field, but also through their head offices – and thus established a local business development office in downtown Calgary about a year ago.

This on-the-ground commitment is critically important as we continue to expand our presence in oilsands, and other aspects of energy such as LNG, where ENTREC is

The crane fleet is capable of mastering any application. The fleet includes: • Crawler cranes for use in oilsands mining and in situ construction, LNG construction, infrastructure and miscellaneous projects • Rough terrain cranes for use in oilsands mining and in situ construction, LNG construction and drilling and other construction projects • Carry deck cranes for use in plant site maintenance and construction • All-terrain cranes used in the oilsands, maintenance and repair operations (MRO), taxi work, LNG drilling, infrastructure and other industrial work • Hydraulic truck cranes used in oilsands MRO, taxi work, LNG drilling, infrastructure and other industrial work • Picker trucks (the largest fleet in Canada) used for in situ MRO in the oilsands, conventional oil and natural gas projects and other industrial work

also well positioned with operations in Kitimat, Prince Rupert and Terrace, British Columbia.”

Currently, ENTREC is doing a wide variety of work for all of the industry’s major oil and gas corporations as well as engineering and procurement companies. The very

www.entrec.com

diverse and extensive client list includes all the heavy hitters across every western Canadian region that has natural resources interests. These clients include: Husky Energy, Suncor Energy, Encana, Esso Imperial Oil, MEG Energy, Canadian Natural Resources, Devon Energy Corporation, Laricina Energy Ltd., Cenovus Energy, ConocoPhillips Canada, Nexen, Shell Canada, Rio Tinto Alcan, Apache, Paramount Resources Ltd., Progress Energy Canada Ltd., WorleyParsons Resources & Energy, Flint Energy Services, Fluor Canada Ltd., JV Driver, Bantrel, PCL Construction, URS Corporation, Express Integrated Technologies LLC, CB&I and Ledcor Group.

In 2014, ENTREC claimed the fourth spot on Alberta Venture’s Fast Growth 50 list and was also named as one of Alberta’s Top 65 Employers. “It all comes back to employee ownership,” says Stevens who credits every hard-working member of the team for the recognitions.

“We are really big believers in employee ownership. It’s been our goal to be in the Top 100 since day one. We achieved this because of our core values and employee ownership program. We built our entire business model on engaged employees and strong core values. Out of 700 employees, about 500 are owners in the company.

This certainly helped us achieve such a high rating in the Top 100 program.”

Another driving factor for the Top Employer’s recognition is ENTREC’s “if it is important to our employees and important to our customers, it’s important to us” philosophy. To this end, ENTREC has supported one of their em-

ployees who ran across Canada in support of cancer research, provided a free barbecue meal to the volunteers helping with the High River flood, donated a bobcat and crew to last year’s flood cleanup efforts, sponsors playgrounds, local 4-H clubs and so much more.

Stevens’ leadership has also been well recognized. In 2013 he was winner in the Leaders of Tomorrow awards and a finalist in the EY Entrepreneur of the Year awards (prairies region) in the emerging entrepreneur category.

The future holds nothing but promise for ENTREC. Bitumen production in the oilsands remains at or above forecasts with a steady increase predicted through 2030. Two proposed LNG export facilities and four possible pipelines prove the outlook for the LNG industry is strong as well. With ENTREC ideally situated in the heart of these thriving sectors, there is only one direction for the company to go: up.

“We are just getting started,” smiles Stevens. “The crane and heavy haul industry is a worldwide industry.

Our goal in 10 to 15 years is to be a global company. We will take advantage of the growth here and then we will venture beyond this geographical region. We will keep growing and succeeding, and we will do it the same way we built our company to this level; with employee ownership and engagement.”

www.entrec.com