Sahara will have a capital of SR 1,500 million ($401 million), SR 500 million ($133 million) of which will be offered to the public in late March. The remaining SR 1,000 million ($267 million) was allocated in a heavily-oversubscribed private placement.

The public offering will be handled by The Consulting Centre for Finance & Investment (CCFI), based in Riyadh. Al-Zamil and CCFI have appointed Riyad Bank, National Commercial Bank and Saudi American Bank to receive the public requests for shares.

Sahara will invest in two major projects to be based in Jubail - a polypropylene (PP) and propane dehydrogenation (PDH) plant and an olefins complex. Under four memoranda of understanding (MoUs) signed last year, Al-Zamil will be assisted by Europe's Basell, the US' UOP, Germany's Lurgiand Italy's Tecnimonton the proposed PP/PDH facility. Basell will provide its Spheripol PP technology and act as offtaker for the bulk of the 450,000 tonnes a year (t/y) of PP to be produced at the plant. The propylene feedstock for the PP plant will be sourced from the PDH plant, which will be built on a separate site and use UOP's Oleflex process. The MoUs with Lurgi and Tecnimont cover the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contracts for the respective PP and PDH units.

The US-based Jacobs Engineering has the contract to provide project management consultancy (PMC) services on the scheme. The project is due for completion in 2007.

Sahara will also invest in an olefins complex in partnership with the local National Petrochemical Industrialisation Company (NPIC). The complex will cover an ethane cracker and a polyolefins unit. The contract to provide PMC services on the scheme is due to be awarded within weeks, industry sources say. ABB Lummus Global, FluorDaniel, both US-based, and Jacobs are among the companies pursuing the contract.