SPETCO

BOLDLY

MOVING FORWARD ON NEW FRONTIERS

One of Kuwait’s leading oil and gas contractors, SPETCO International Petroleum, remains on a winning streak, securing several lucrative contracts. According to Tammer Azzouz, Executive Vice President, the local Kuwaiti company is intent on expanding its reach even further across the Middle East.

Interview by Andy Probert

Spetco Executive Vice President, Tammer Azzouz

SPETCO International Petroleum continues to set the pace as a lead specialist in the upstream, midstream and fabrication services sectors despite the headwinds and global difficulties created by the pandemic.

Fresh from securing contracts with Kuwait Oil Company (KOC) for two out of the five total Jurassic Production facilities (JPF-3 and JPF-4) and supply, installation, and O&M services on sucker rod pumps in oil fields, SPETCO is keen to grow beyond its borders and serve across the Middle East.

“Since 2019, the world has changed dramatically due to Covid-19, but fortunately for us, we have navigated through that very effectively. During that time, we have been very fortunate to have expanded the business,” said Tammer Azzouz, SPETCO Executive Vice President.

Going strong in Kuwait

Kuwait is presently focusing on Jurassic carbonate reservoirs in the country’s north to meet soaring gas consumption. The reservoirs contain hydrocarbons ranging from oil to gas condensate with sour gas.

SPETCO has been intrinsically linked with KOC from the outset, having partnered with KOC to pioneer the Build-Own-Operate (BOO) project model through the pilot 10 MBPOD Early Production Facility (EPF) in 2003. The success of which has lead KOC to develop and tender seven such facilities, of which SPETCO has been awarded four of the facilities.

In July 2016, KOC awarded SPETCO JPF-3, a contract for $377 million, in the West Raudhatain field. This facility was later expanded as a fast-track project to double the gas capacity, with the facility commissioned by mid-2022, two months ahead of schedule.

In December 2021, SPETCO won a $400 million contract to build JPF-4, an onshore surface production facility with a capacity to produce 50,000 bpd of treated sweet crude and 150 million standard cubic feet daily of sweet and dehydrated rich gas and a 240 tons per day Sulphur Recovery Unit.

Close to the Sabriyah field, it will test, process, treat, and handle wet and sour hydrocarbon well fluids from multiple oil and gas wells within the Jurassic fields.

Additionally, in 2022, SPETCO won a $172 million contract, awarded by KOC, to supply, install, operate and maintain suction rod pumps in oil fields.

The contract awards confirm how far SPETCO has advanced over three decades since Hani Qaddumi established it. Now under the shrewd and able leadership of the Chairman Dr. Nabil Qaddumi and CEO Tareq Qaddumi, the company continues to diversify.

The Ahmadi-based company excels in upstream oilfield services, comprising of artificial lift systems, production well testing, and miscellaneous oil field services.

Acknowledging turnover at over $51 million in 2021, Mr Azzouz commented “SPETCO has been steadily increasing its performance by 25% since 2018 and has seen a 50% rise in turnover between 2018 and 2021, and we expect for 2022 an even larger growth”

“While we are proud to have over $1 billion in running contracts in Kuwait, we remain focused on developing new technologies in the oil and gas services side, and alert to production opportunities.”

Moving forward

In 2015, the company reached into the UAE as a fully licensed legal entity as SPETCO Gulf Oilwell Maintenance. “This proved to be an exceptionally positive and dynamic experience as we picked up contracts with ADNOC,” he said.

SPETCO INTERNATIONAL PETROLEUM I PROFILE

“We have also pre-qualified on contracts in other areas in Abu Dhabi and continue to make major headway in positioning ourselves for upcoming contracts in the midstream facilities, and upstream services side.”

He added that SPETCO’s main priorities were enhancing its performance by expanding services offered and maximising contracts, while maintaining market share in service areas, such as well testing and sucker rod pumping provision. In 2018, SPETCO opened its fully automated pipe and structural welding and fabrication facility in Mina Abdulla, capable of high quality and high efficiency production. Initially catering only to SPETCO projects, this facility was targeted with the goals of supporting all oil and gas production facility and pipeline/flowline contracts in Kuwait.

The company remains committed to further regional expansion, having established a full-fledged office in Oman and currently positioning itself with Saudi Aramco.

Mr Azzouz confirmed: “We try to do this through local relationships as this is the best way to navigate the risk of opening in a new region.

“We want to bring the set-up and strengths that we have in Kuwait by taking the next step and replicating them in other areas and try to diversify our business risk.”

He said a key strength was being highly agile to meet client demands. “We delivered the JPF-3 expansion project 60 days ahead of time. That is the second expansion completed ahead of delivery: the first being 70 days ahead of time for a gas sweetening facility expansion. The challenge on these expansions is that you are doing work at live plants. Of course, safety is key, and we achieved both projects without incident, which is a credit to the synergies between our projects and operations teams.”

He advanced: “We are self-sufficient, meaning we have all the expertise in-house, enabling us to remain highly agile amid the pandemic. However, Covid has reshaped the working environment with people working more remotely, when necessary, which SPETCO is evolving with.”

Mr Azzouz said SPETCO was aligned and trying to get ahead of government pressure on industry to recruit locally. “It is a necessary stepping stone for the sustainability of Kuwait.

We have made strides and continue to push for local participation in our operations.”

While citing the company’s specialities in the facilities and well- testing sides, he said: “Our experience is strong, with inhouse capabilities, fully qualified teams and the ability to manoeuvre and adapt rapidly. One of our core strengths is in procurement and our ability to source, identify, and work with vendors globally. We are very proud to have long term relationships with key vendors around the world signifying our commitment to them as partners in our success.”

“We see ourselves as the premier local company in production facilities and oil field services. Being dependable, reliable and trustworthy on these fronts are replicated in our long-standing relations with clients and suppliers.”

He concluded: “We remain a forward-looking company. It’s a credit to our Chairman, CEO and COO Mr Eyas Jadaane: they are not looking at what is necessarily in hand, but where the company needs to be in five to ten years. We want to be relentlessly pushing forward and setting our sights higher.” n