It might not be glamorous but the hottest property sector in the UAE is industrial space.

Art galleries share warehouse space with mechanic shops in the Al Quoz industrial area in Dubai. Sammy Dallal / The National

Office complexes, residential towers and shopping malls with ski slopes get the bulk of the attention, but warehouses and logistics centres are attracting investors and tenants, analysts say. Cushman & Wakefield, a global property company, recently ranked Abu Dhabi the 10th most expensive industrial market in the world, a notch below Paris.

Industrial space was “less subjected to speculative development”, said David Quinn, the head of UAE operations for Cushman & Wakefield. “Because it wasn’t sexy it wasn’t developed in the boom years in the same way as offices and residential.”

Light industrial and logistics buildings will be the best-performing sector this year, Jones Lang LaSalle, an international property consultancy, predicted in a report released this week. Investors like the steady yields and relatively low risk offered by industrial space, according to Andrew Charlesworth, the head of capital markets in the UAE for Jones Lang LaSalle.

“People are looking for alternative classes,” he said.

But there are few industrial properties available for sale, Mr Charlesworth said. Either buildings are controlled by government agencies or they were built for specific companies.

“Investors are trying to find a way in, but there aren’t deals to be done,” Mr Charlesworth said.

Rents for industrial space fell during the economic crisis, mirroring the trends in other sectors.

Dubai rates have fallen from about Dh500 (US$136.12) a square metre to Dh250 a sq metre, according to data from CB Richard Ellis (CBRE), another international property company. In Abu Dhabi, rental rates that were more than Dh1,900 a sq metre in 2008 are now closer to Dh750 a sq metre.

But rents have started to stabilise in many areas.

“There is a lot more demand [in Abu Dhabi] than a year ago,” said El Fatih Said, the chief executive of the Abu Dhabi Business Hub, which developed and leases 67,000 sq metres of warehouse facilities in Musaffah that were completed in 2009.

At first leasing was “very, very slow”, said Mr Said. But the facility is now 83 per cent leased, although the prices have dropped from Dh1,000 a sq metre to Dh660.

“It’s a very complicated market,” he said.

The majority of industrial space in Abu Dhabi is located in the older, more established area of Musaffah and in the new Industrial City of Abu Dhabi, according to Cushman & Wakefield. Non-free zone industrial rents in Dubai remain 25 to 30 per cent lower than those in Abu Dhabi, the company added.

New industrial space under construction throughout the UAE should put further pressure on prices, analysts say. The Khalifa Port and Industrial Zone outside Abu Dhabi and the Dubai Industrial City, which covers 5,202 hectares, as well as the Jebel Ali Free Zone, offers tenants a wide variety of options.

But the industrial sector will benefit from a recovery in the UAE economy, which should spur demand, analysts say.

Trade volumes are on the rise, which should directly boost demand for industrial space. Non-oil related trade rose 11.5 per cent in the first 10 months of last year, compared with the same period in 2009, according to Federal Customs Authority data. The UAE’s GDP is expected to grow 4.7 per cent this year, the economics analyst Global Insights predicts.

Industrial projects will also benefit from an estimated $45 billion the UAE is spending on infrastructure projects, Jones Lang LaSalle says, including the Union Railway construction and metro lines in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

“The [Federal] Government is looking to move back to basics,” said Matthew Green, the UAE head of research for CBRE. “Certainly there is going to be a big focus on industrials.”

kbrass@thenational.ae

Dubai Industrial City, the region’s leading manufacturing and logistics destination and a member of Tecom Investments, today announced United Metal Coating LLC (UMC) has commenced operations at the 195,000 sq ft facility in its premises.

United Metal Coating commences operations at the 195,000 sq ft facility in its premises.

A state-of-the-art continuous coil coating line in the region, the UMC facility is located in the base metal zone of Dubai Industrial City. UMC will manufacture pre-painted aluminum and galvanized steel coils in various thickness and width with an annual production capacity of 75,000 metric ton for the end application of building products including roofing and claddings, as well as interior false ceilings and rolling shutters.

UMC also has a double loop slitting line to slit the painted coils into different widths as per customers’ requirements. The coil coating line has equipment imported from Germany, the UK, the US and India to ensure consistent product quality and conform to international standards such as the ECCA, EN, DIN, ASTM and JIS.

Abdulla Belhoul, Managing Director, Manufacturing and Logistics Cluster, Tecom Investments, said, “We commend United Metal Coating for commencing operations at its new plant within our premises. Like other zones, the base metal zone in Dubai Industrial City also offers the best services and facilities that have attracted leading regional companies. We are confident United Metal Coating will find the environment suitable for manufacturing and further business growth.”

Souheil Hatoum, Managing Partner of UMC, said, “More than 50% of our products from this facility will be exported to Europe while the remaining quantity will be slated for consumption in the UAE, GCC and Middle East. We implement stringent quality control systems that make us one of the leading exporters of prepainted coils from the region.”

Hatoum added, “Operating from Dubai Industrial City will make our products highly competitive as we will benefit from the top of the range facilities offered by the comprehensive industrial destination. In addition, the business-friendly environment will also help us focus better on further expansion. We are privileged to be part of an elite group of industry peers that are already based at Dubai Industrial City.”

Sridharan, Partner and the Technical Manager of United Metal Coating, said, “United Metal Coating has a firm commitment towards maintaining an eco-friendly environment. This is the key reason for installing the most sophisticated incinerator imported from renowned German firm WYK to completely burn the solvents generated from the production, leaving no room for atmospheric pollution. UMC proudly announces this is the first of its kind in the UAE.”

Located on Emirates Road near the new Al Maktoum International Airport, Dubai Industrial City offers a strategic advantage due to its proximity to major highways and the Jebel Ali Port. The 560 million sq ft dedicated manufacturing destination comprises six industrial clusters for food and beverage, base metals, mineral products, chemicals, transport equipment and parts as well as machinery and mechanical equipment.

Designed to incorporate additional facilities for logistics, warehousing and labour accommodation, Dubai Industrial City serves as an integrated one-stop destination, providing tenants with a critical competitive advantage in terms of cost and business efficiencies, as well as strategic location and ability to export goods tariff free to countries governed by bilateral free trade agreements.

Napco, a specialist manufacturer of adhesives and coatings for the HVAC sector, is contemplating construction of a purpose-built, state-of-the-art plant in Dubai Industrial City.

“Our reason for choosing Sharjah initially was that it was an industrial base. At the same time we have been presented with a good opportunity in Dubai, which is starting to pick up again. We hope the recovery will continue and lead to sustained growth going forward,” says Napco chairman Dr Mumraiz K. Awan.

Dr Awan says the recent power outages in Sharjah had caused a backlog at Napco’s Sharjah plant, which was running 24/7 in order to catch up.

Napco’s latest quality accreditation is ‘UL Classified’ from Underwriters’ Laboratory of the US. “This is a comprehensive certification that takes production into account as well. It is a parallel standard we have adopted in order to complement our UK accreditation,” says Dr Awan.

Leminar Airconditioning is Napco’s official distributor in the UAE.

The city of Dubai has long been on the list of travel hotspots in the world. Considered to be one of the most well built townships in the world, the city has a number of famous buildings and landmarks that give it its original sheen.

The city of Dubai has long been on the list of travel hotspots in the world. Considered to be one of the most well built townships in the world, the city has a number of famous buildings and landmarks that give it its original sheen. However, what has made it so popular among tourists is the availability of a number of hotels.

The hotels in Dubai are not only luxurious and provide comfortable amenities but also are very affordable. Their location and proximity to the city, and comfortable residential areas, make these Dubai hotels a popular choice among all people. The popularity of Dubai luxury hotels is such that tourists are finding it hard to book a room during peak hour vacation time.

Luxury and comfort are among the prime criteria for tourists on a vacation. Most tourists look for places that offer comfortable stay, vacationing spots and luxurious facilities to make their stay much more pleasant. All these are the main features of many Dubai hotels. The luxury and comfort of these hotels has seen a consistent rise in the last couple of years. No wonder it is among the main sources of income for the city of Dubai. The tourist attraction to Dubai has resulted in disadvantages as well as advantages. The disadvantage being, that most of these Dubai hotels are very hard to book. The best option for tourists traveling to the city is to book their rooms in Dubai resorts in advance. This will help them enjoy the sights of the city without bothering about accommodation.

Other than these the location of these Dubai hotels makes them an automatic choice for tourists. These resorts also boast of a number of things for tourists to do there like parasailing, kayaking, wind surfing and deep sea fishing. Other than luxury hotels, there are a lot of other boarding facilities in the city. These include the Dubai hotel apartments which offer people with a residential facility complete with all the amenities and appliances that is most suitable for a longer stay. These Dubai hotel apartments are a popular choice among the middle class and working businessmen who travel to the city and stay over for a longer period of time.

The best way to book a room in Dubai cheap hotels is to use the internet. There are a number of sites that provide customers and tourists with information about Dubai hotel apartments and the availability of accommodation. Tourists can check these hotels in Dubai for their price range and comfort level and choose the one that is most suitable for their requirements. It would be a good idea to compare the prices and comforts offered by these hotels before deciding to go with one. Booking in advance also prevents the discomfort of tourists having to worry about accommodations instead of looking forward to their holiday and having a good time. Staying at these hotels will definitely give them an experience of what luxury actually means, and will also save them a lot of money.

Resources:

SouthTravels is the author of this article on Dubai Hotels.
Find more information about Hotels in Dubai here.

Alliance Medical Group creditors yesterday wrote to the company calling for it to be sold instead of a planned £35 million (Dh198.1m) cash injection from its owner, Dubai International Capital.

A group of senior creditors owed money by Alliance, which DIC bought in 2007 for £600m, sent a letter to the company and its advisers asking to begin the search for a buyer. Alliance’s board could approve a sale as early as this week.

DIC, a private equity unit of the government-owned Dubai Holding, wants to restructure Alliance’s business in co-operation with its junior lenders. Their plan, advanced in July, was to inject fresh funds to help meet upcoming payments on debts of about £500m.

But the senior lenders are now looking at a possible sale as a better way for the company to raise money and handle debts.

Representatives of DIC could not be reached. Alliance declined to comment.

Recent media reports from the UK, where Alliance is a major provider of MRI and CT scanning services, have suggested a sale may be in the offing if restructuring talks break down before a debt repayment standstill expires on September 16.

Some bankers, however, have hinted that raising the prospect of a sale could merely be a way for banks to jockey for better terms.

A sale could be bad for DIC because as an equity holder it is lower than senior creditors in Alliance’s financial pecking order.

Blackstone, which is advising Alliance, recently valued the company at between £300m to £340m. Depending on how a sale is structured, senior creditors could receive a large chunk of the proceeds, leaving DIC with little to show for its £600m investment made at the peak of the takeover boom in 2007.

The wrangling over Alliance follows the recent end of a contentious battle between DIC and Oaktree Capital Management over Almatis, a German aluminium company.

DIC, which bought Almatis in 2007 for an undisclosed price, got into a row with Oaktree over competing plans to restore Almatis to financial health during bankruptcy hearings in the US.

Oaktree, a major creditor of Almatis, settled the dispute this month by withdrawing a request for DIC to relinquish control of the company.

As DIC settles disputes at companies in its private equity portfolio, it is also addressing borrowings it used to make some of its large acquisitions. DIC in May said it reached a deal to postpone debt repayments for three months.

DIC’s parent company, meanwhile, is facing challenges of its own. Dubai Holding recently sold stakes in several companies it acquired in 2006 and 2007 after the reorganisation of its business into four “verticals” last year: business parks; hospitality; property; and investments.

Late last week its Dubai Financial Group subsidiary sold a 4 per cent stake in the Bombay Stock Exchange, Asia’s oldest bourse, to the billionaire investor George Soros for a reported US$35m (Dh128.5m).

Dubai Holding owns some of the emirate’s most prized assets. The Jumeirah Group, which owns Dubai’s Burj Al Arab hotel, and TECOM Investments, which runs Dubai Media City, Dubai Internet City and other economic free zones in the emirate, are among the companies in its portfolio.

afitch@thenational.ae

The local Alec has opened a new factory at the Dubai Industrial City.

The facility will contain five manufacturing or processing facilities to support the construction division of the company including rebar, formwork, mechanical, electrical and plumbing (MEP), ceiling and partition as well as facilities management. The total area is about 42,000 square metres.

“Our new facility in Dubai Industrial City is part of a strategic initiative to consolidate the supporting divisions of our umbrella group to improve efficiency across our operations,” Sivanand Krishnan, factory manager.

Alec is construction contractor and its projects include resort hotels, themed retail developments, high rise towers, airport terminals and commercial buildings.

In early July Alec won a AED100m ($27m) contract to build the new Dubai Country Club and associated facilities in Dubailand, which is located behind Arabian Ranches

Dubai: Mesha’al Hamed Kanoo is deputy chairman of the Kanoo Group, one of the largest independent, family-owned groups of companies in the Gulf.

Mesha'al Hamed Kanoo, deputy chairman, the Kanoo Group, says it is important for businesses to focus on what they’re good at and do it well not only for the sake of the company but for its clients as well. Image Credit: Zarina fernandes/Gulf News

Due to his extensive knowledge of the local economy and global capital markets he is a frequent speaker at conferences around the Gulf as well as an opinion writer and columnist for various magazines and newspapers in the UAE. Kanoo is a strong advocate of education, and believes that it is important to allow progression as it enables people to take responsibility and control of their lives.

The Kanoo Group, which is based in Bahrain with a presence in the UAE, Oman and Saudi Arabia, is one of the most diversified family businesses in the region with interests in shipping, travel, machinery, logistics, oil and gas, chemicals, retail and various commercial activities.

In an exclusive interview with Gulf News, Kanoo speaks about diverse aspects of the business.

GULF NEWS: What factors do you think can play a significant role in the UAE’s economic recovery?

Mesha’al Hamed Kanoo: Banks need to start pumping more liquidity into the market. Some banks have been aggressive in terms of lending but many still remain quite conservative. I don’t know which direction all the banks will go towards, but I sincerely hope they move towards being more relaxed.

You also need rules and regulations that support bankruptcy, repossession, security and safety of the bank and these need to be enforced.

What sectors are experiencing growth, despite parts of the economy still being battered?

There is growth in the travel sector. It’s not the same as 2006 levels but from 2009 to 2010 there has been growth. The main industries which are going to take a long time to recover are real estate and advertising.

As far as oil and gas is concerned, it’s something that’s continued to boom and the effect will be marginal. Yes it has dropped from $150 to $70/$80 per barrel, but if you look at it in retrospect we went from $30 to $150, so there has been growth.

Strange as it may seem, Dubai as a city has kept its values. It’s the new Dubai that has taken a significant beating.

The one industry that’s going to benefit the most will be the cheap end of the food chain, whether its frozen food, fast food, restaurants… people have been economising but they still want to eat.

You’ll see a similar pattern happening with all goods. People won’t give up their luxury items but will economise by buying from the cheaper end of the spectrum.

As a company that has been in the travel business since 1947 with 200 offices spread across the Middle East, what is your outlook on the travel industry and which direction can you feel it heading?

Without a doubt, 2009 was a horrible year while 2010 has somewhat picked up. What happened was that the number of travelers didn’t change, the class did. Businesses cut costs by implementing a new rule that says if a Business Class flight for an employee was less than eight hours from Dubai, the employee would have to fly Economy.

Because of this, flight prices for Business Class dropped. For example, the Business Class flight from Dubai to Bahrain was in the range of Dh3,500 to Dh4,000; now it’s Dh3,200 to Dh3,500. However, four years ago it was Dh3,000 for First Class. Although you did have a drop from the height, it still hasn’t come down to the 2006 levels.

It has been close to 15 years since the internet revolution happened and one of the biggest utilisers of online retail is the travel industry. These sites are very popular in Europe and the US but it’s still not a big player in this region. There is still no local centralised reservation system that can tell you all the different prices of the airlines.

People still have a mistrust in using their credit card on the internet. If you look at the mentality of the people in the region, we like to be served and we do not like to serve ourselves. We also need someone to complain to. If I book the ticket and things go wrong, whom can I blame?

You recently inaugurated Kanoo Engineering’s main headquarters in Dubai Industrial City. What are your expansion plans with other industrial projects?

We are looking at building more companies in Dubai Industrial City. Steel rebar company BRC is being constructed on the same site and should be ready in about nine months. We also have four other companies due to be launched and built in the area.

How are the different businesses of your company faring?

We have some sectors that are improving while in other sectors we are suffering because our creditors aren’t able to pay us. The majority of the creditors are in the construction business and they’re having problems getting the money from the developers and subsequently their problems are becoming our problems.

There are telltale signs that there is an improvement in the market. There is a growing number of small projects coming through which are the backbone of economic growth. It’s the larger ones I will not be betting on happening. The main problem to date is still the issue of liquidity and whether the banks are going to release some of the money into the market or not.

The economy is going to grow. It’s not going to grow on the back of big projects but on the back of small projects. It is those industries that are going to continue to bring growth back to the region. If we can understand that, things can move forward. One of the main things most people do when the economy takes a downturn is cut down on staff.

Because we’re a family business our main concern is to try to reposition a person into a different part if he or she can’t function in one part of the company. Should that fail to happen, we try and give them the training that they need. If they’ve done a drastic mistake, cost us money or stolen from us then it’s an immediate dismissal. My family has been in the business for more than 20 years. We’ve learnt over time that these downturns and upturns are mere blips.

Do you have any plans of expansions with your different business lines?

I’m currently more interested in consolidating what I have. It’s important for businesses to focus on what they’re good at and do it well not only for the sake of the company but for the clients as well.

A majority of our business streams have not changed since the 1970s. It doesn’t mean we can’t expand within that business. For example, within Oman we have expanded our engineering companies so we provide all the products that go into engineering. It’s a natural progression.

We are fortunate as a company to be in a position where borrowing loans from banks does play a role but is not something that will stop us. Because our company is large and multinational, we can always stretch our hand out to our sister companies. But it shouldn’t be something that’s just taken as the norm. If the opportunity pops up we should grasp that opportunity.

Kanoo is now a sixth-generation business. Family businesses generally only last two to three generations. What is the key to maintaining its success and continued growth?

Respect. I don’t know how to emphasise this word more, but it is a key point. The issue of respect in our company is very important. When you’re hiring a person to do a certain job, they’re not your slaves. The best way of getting people to work with you for a long time is by giving them respect.

I have a family business and have a high amount of respect for people that work with me. We have cases where some of our employees have been sucked up into the credit card schemes. If they come to us and tell us this is the situation they will tell us to refinance to work it out.

Mishal Kanoo speaks about his firm’s latest engineering venture, as well as it’s plant buying strategy.

There is nothing like the buzz of mig welders, accompanied by the sound and sparks of angle grinders, set off by the din of clanking great hammers.

It’s true that this cacophony is something of an acquired taste, but to us it signifies that an industry is getting back on it’s feet – and doing exactly what you’d expect a plant yard to.

Of course, all too many plant yards are silent in the summer heat, but one place where this is not the case is a new yard belonging to the Kanoo group. Unlike the group’s other ventures, the new engineering division is devoted solely to metal fabrication.

However, deputy chairman Mishal Kanoo is keen to point out that while opening up to the current oil and gas market is a good plan, the company hasn’t turned it’s back on construction. “It is still construction. There are different types, whether it is infrastructure, warehouse construction, oil and gas. All of these require steel fabrication. So we haven’t exactly moved out from our area of experience or expertise. What we have done is added a new dimension into it” he explained.

Fabrication

While it is certainly the case that the plant can fabricate steel for just about anything, it is also obvious that the main clients are going to be paying with the proceeds of ‘black gold’. At the time of our visit, which was the official opening day, workers were busy using a special welding process to make some pipeline, while elsewhere in the workshop another team were busy chopping metal and bolting together more precision steels for something else that could only belong on a drilling rig.

There is clever equipment here as well. Besides the usual tools, the plant boasts brand-new plasma welding equipment, as well as the latest in cutting technology such as the OmniPro waterjet. There is a variety of other high-ticket items, such as Kingsland fixed saws and other fancy gear.

Mishal Kanoo was clear that each machine had been bough for a specific job – the firm had not just piled in equipment because it could get a discount during the ressession. “We’d like to think of ourselves as ‘just in  time’” he explained. “Just because I find something 50% of it’s original price doesn’t mean I should buy it as I’ll also be locking away 50% of the value. With things being as tight as they are, we are careful with the equipment we buy.” He added that if a machine is utilised and makes money, then it will, of course, be bought.

Remote

Situated in the very furthest end of Dubai Industrial City, near the Abu Dhabi border it is harder to imagine a more remote location. Although the word ‘city’ is included in the development’s name, in fact open desert surrounds the plant and the dusty access road makes it anything but. However, there is strategic value in such a barren place, as Mishal Kanoo assures us: “It is very close to Emirates Road, and though DIC is at a nascent stage of its growth right now, most people are of the belief that you are in the ‘booleylands’ out here. We’ll see in a few years if it really is.”

There is more than one non-freezone industrial estate in Dubai of course. Kanoo points out: “There are three major areas, Al Quoz is one, Al Awir is another and this will become the third. Jebel Ali is another, but unless you are a freezone company there is an issue with that one.” He also pointed out that Al Awir is mostly full of business patching up old trucks, and so he was keen to try somewhere entirely new.

We wondered, given the group’s large presence in Saudi Arabia why it had chosen to manufacture in Dubai – particularly considering the amount of oil and gas infrastructure in that country. Kanoo replied simply: “Our plan is to fabricate here and ship it out. We have [done fabrication in Saudi] in the past, but now the target is to consolidate all the fabrication here.”

Neither does he seem particularly concerned about the competition in what is a fairly crowded sector. With contracts for industrial projects seeming to come up far more often at the moment, and be more lucrative than real estate, there will be established player, as well as those looking to take a slice of the action. However, if Mishal Kanoo is concerned about the opposition he doesn’t show it “We’ll see in a few months if these competitors really exist!” He added: “With the credit crunch the way it is, courtesy of how the banks are handling the liquidity, which is not very good, we will see how many of these companies can survive.”

Dubai Industrial City announced that Al Jaber LEGT Engineering and Contracting LLC opened its new factory on 420,000 square feet plot at the machinery and equipment zone of the industrial destination.

With 5 manufacturing processing divisions including rebar, formwork, MEP, ceiling and partition as well as facilities management divisions, the new facility aims to serve the projects undertaken by the construction division of the parent company ALEC.

ALEC started in the UAE in 1999, with a firm vision to raise the level of design and construction services and has consistently evolved and grown. Today, ALEC is a preferred contractor for the execution of major construction projects.

ALEC currently operates in Dubai and Abu Dhabi and has delivered developments of the highest quality to key clients. Many of these developments have become significant landmarks in the UAE. The scope of ALEC’s projects includes resort hotels, themed retail developments, high rise towers, airport terminals and commercial buildings.

In the ascent of Dubai and Abu Dhabi’s building markets over the last decade Al Jaber LEGT Engineering & Contracting (ALEC)’s building business grew from almost nothing to a US$1 billion company.

Winning its first contract in January 2002 for the Mina a’ Salam complex – commissioned by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, no less – the company and its managing director, Keiron ‘Kez’ Taylor, haven’t looked back, except perhaps to marvel at the dramatic decade just gone.

“We’ve been through the two extremes: a massive boom whereby the only restriction was your capacity – whatever it was, you could perform at that level – to an extreme where you are consolidating where it’s a tight market,” says Taylor in the company’s office in Dubai Industrial City.

ALEC has another office in Abu Dhabi, and Taylor points out that the more challenging market conditions in the region’s contracting markets has resulted in a ‘huge shift’ in business from the former to the latter. But when it comes to some of the company’s projects – in particular the AED 4.5 billion contract to build the third concourse for Dubai International Airport – calculating the work split between the two emirates is not so straight forward.

“The airport is a huge job in terms of resource, and we have a lot of people here working on it. With that project the split in business is about 60% Dubai and 40% Abu Dhabi in terms of work, value and turnover,” he says. “If we didn’t have it, it would be a totally different mix – I’d say 80 or 90% of business based in Abu Dhabi. There has been a huge shift towards Abu Dhabi.”

Alec’s construction business has produced some large and eye-catching projects. Its growth and attraction to developers has allowed it to work on major projects across the two emirates in retail, airports, hotels as well as high-rise buildings.

This has included work on hotels and golf clubs on Saadiyat Island and Yas Island in the capital, both the Abu Dhabi and Dubai international airports, the Dubai Marina mall and the ambitiously green Mirdiff City Centre, and the multi-purpose Madinat.

The company was forged through a joint venture between Al Jaber Group and Grinaker-LTA, a multi-disciplinary construction firm in South Africa. After a few years Al Jaber bought out the shares from Grinaker-LTA and offered 20% of them to what is now the current management.

But Cape Town-bred Taylor and around 8% of the staff retain the connection to South Africa. Graduating in construction management in University of Witswatersrand in Johannesburg, Taylor’s association with Grinaker-LTA began with a bursary at the firm. The company’s joint venture with Al Jaber took him north east in October 2001, to Dubai, to help set up the construction division of Alec.

Within three months, the company had snapped up that all-important mandate from Dubai’s ruler.

As he looks back now on that first project, he smiles: “We couldn’t fail, we had to succeed! That was the first project and it was a very quick programme. We had to building it in 17 months in time for a conference and we successfully did that.”

Over the last few years ALEC has grown by adding new business lines – sensibly termed Related Businesses – that complement its core construction strength, and in a sense fill in the gaps along the contracting chain. These include MEP work, fit-out, ceilings and partitions and architectural precast.

“These related businesses complement what we do as activities,” says Taylor. “The reasons for setting these up are that they assist us to complete our projects in a timely and integrated way.”

Of the MEP work, now four years old, he adds: “At the time we were struggling to find good, confident MEP contractors with the capacity who could meet our kind of demands. That pretty much started it off, and we decided: let’s start up an MEP arm. It’s been very successful.”

The Qasr Al Sarab Desert Resort & Spa project, a 156-room five-star hotel in the Liwa Desert, is one such project in which the company has been mandated for MEP work. It is also providing the same service for the Park Hyatt Hotel on Saadiyat Island (in a joint venture with TransGulf), a project for which it is also main contractor – a good example of Alec’s ability to work on multiple parts of a project based on its expanded suite of services.

“This is pretty much a resort design, right on the beach and will be the first operational hotel on Saadiyat Island,” he notes. “We have completed the structures and are now busy with the finishing.”

Saadiyat Island is also the venue for the company to explore ways in which it can use technology to build more environmentally beneficial buildings.

“We’re looking at a project now on Saadiyat Island that has a glazed roof,” he explains. “We are investigating whether you can utilise photovoltaic glass sections that can be incorporated into the design.”

The process by which subsidiary businesses are created is a matter of accommodation, he says.

Alec typically brings in specialists who are known in the industry, often those the company has worked with before. There is a degree of fluidity in bringing in new talent – the companies are not tied exclusively to Alec and so their range of experience as to how the rest of the market is building can only increase.

The work by its ceilings team on the 587,000m² Mirdiff City Centre mall, the second biggest shopping centre in the Middle East, is a key example.

“ALEC is an umbrella – a platform whereby these businesses can flourish and operate,” Taylor explains.

“If you look at Mirdiff City Centre, ALEC did all the ceilings and there was no issue in holding up the project. It was actually a benefit that we had the in-house business and the expertise to do that job – and there was about 80,000m² of ceiling there.

“I think what we strive for is to pull off jobs on time. We have a track record of completing projects on time and that’s what we try to achieve.”

The Yas Links Golf Club House on Yas Island saw the company win an even wider mandate, this time driving both the design, construction, MEP work, ceilings, fit-out and pre-cast components in an AED195 million contract from Aldar Properties, the developer.

Taylor points out that although the company might end up working on more elements of a single project than before, the input from the consultant remains the same. But he is adamant that closing the gap between design and construction is vital for producing the most cost-effective building.

“A lot of the delays in construction are in design flow,” he says. “So if you can be participating in the design and getting it integrated with the construction, what you end up with is a much more cost-effective result. Often a designer working in isolation without a specialist contractor working side-by-side doesn’t always end up with the best result.