How has the Middle East market performed for your company over the past three years?
We are currently placing more focus on Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar, where we believe the potential is higher than other markets due to the large-scale infrastructure projects announced by those governments. These include housing projects, medical cities, airports, highways, metros, schools and universities, power generation, and oil and gas.

Where do you anticipate growth over the next three years?
In general, the Gulf market will continue to see healthy and steady growth, reflecting the spending of governments on developing their countries infrastructure.

Where do you see the main opportunities for El-Seif Group?
Although the construction market is growing in the Gulf region, we see the best opportunities for us in large-scale, specialised schemes that require high levels of sophistication and creativity in construction methods. This will reflect our standard of top-quality work, which is unique in every project we deliver.

What are the challenges facing your firm?
The construction industry continues to face challenges in sourcing qualified labour.

Highlight a recent project that has been significant to El-Seif.
El-Seif prides itself in completing package 3 at the Princess Noura University in Riyadh on time and within just two years. El-Seif’s role in this significant project was as the main contractor for the whole infrastructure, site development and support buildings of the university on an area of 8 million square metres.

The scheme’s scope included all civil, structural, architectural, mechanical and electrical works for utility and supporting buildings, infrastructure, landscaping, site grading, utility tunnels, fly-over bridges, road works, the world’s largest chiller plant, solid-waste management, a sewage treatment plant, a power plant, sewage and drainage systems, soft and hard landscaping and 750,000 metres of services.