Aker Kvaerner may be on the road to recovery, but the past five years have left deep scars. Bitter experience means it is no longer willing to take on the excessive risk associated with large-scale EPC contracts. Instead, it is focusing on medium-size contracts, front-end engineering and design (FEED) and project management consultant (PMC) work, as well as petrochemical projects - where it can use its considerable process capability.

'We are not seeking adventure and are not only after mega-projects,' says president and chief executive officer (CEO) Inge Hansen. 'A typical project would now be in the range of $200 million-250 million. That is where we believe we can leverage our capability and the risk is low.'

The type of projects it is targeting has shifted, too. 'We have moved away from being a general contractor to focus on key technologies and client relationships,' says Hansen. Aker Kvaerner's selective bidding approach is illustrated in the Middle East, where its primary focus has been shifting onto the Saudi Arabian petrochemicals sector. At present, it is working on a single EPC contract in Saudi Arabia, the $140 million-150 million package for the 75,000-tonne-a-day butanediol (BDO) unit on the Saudi International Petrochemical Company (Sipchem) development. 'If you look at the investments planned in Jubail, there are about 40 projects in the range of $100 million-150 million,' says AK Process president Wim van der Zande. 'Our target is two or three of the projects, so we will not be massive.'

Aker Kvaerner is no stranger to the kingdom, having completed 16 projects for major clients. As part of its sales push, it consolidated last year its business units in Saudi Arabia - John Brown SA and Saudi Davy Company - into a new entity. Based in Al-Khobar, AK Gulf is a 75:25 per cent joint venture of AK Process and Saudi Pan Gulf and focuses on providing engineering and construction services.

Of the eight technology positions it holds, Aker Kvaerner's greatest experience is on the Unipol polyethylene technology. In the past 10 years alone, it has installed more than 4 million tonnes a year (t/y) of Unipol capacity and is looking to extend its experience further, especially with Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (Sabic).

Elsewhere in the Gulf petrochemicals sector, Aker Kvaerner is adopting a highly selective bidding approach. Its most notable target is the PMC contract on the third phase of the Abu Dhabi Polymers Company (Borouge) development. Three other international firms are competing for the contract on the estimated $2,500 million project, which is likely to centre on the construction of a 1.4 million-t/y ethane cracker.

The upstream oil and gas sector is still very much a core business for the company, which has considerable experience of working in the North Sea. Its most immediate regional prospect is in Iran, where Aker Kvaerner is part of the Iranian-led consortium selected for negotiations by Pars Oil & Gas Company (POGC) for the estimated $2,000 million EPC package on South Pars 15-16.

Technology leads

Although it has not bid on any of the growing number of gas export projects in the Gulf, the rise of regional liquefied natural gas (LNG) is providing opportunities for the