Two companies, Italy's Danieli & Companyand Austria's Voest Alpine Industrieanlagenbau (VAI), are understood to be left in the race for the contract, after at least one company withdrew from bidding for the scheme. The contract calls for the installation of a cold rolling mill and a galvanising line, bringing the plant's total steel throughput capacity to almost 250,000 tonnes a year (t/y) from the present design capacity of about 120,000 t/y of coated steel products. The contract is valued at more than $100 million.

The existing coil paint line is capable of painting the full range of coil strip products, including galvanised steel, zinc aluminium coated steel, aluminium, tinplate and cold rolled steel. The facility, the first high-speed continuous coil painting facility in the Middle East, started commercial production in May 1998.

Unicoil is a joint venture between Australia's BHP Billitonand AH Al-Zamil Group and Rashed al-Rashed & Sons, both local.