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 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.