TAQA on Track to Invest $1 Billion in Q4

ABU DHABI - The Abu Dhabi National Energy Company, or TAQA, will “continue its buying spree’ and is in talks with three companies in the mid- and downstream sector to meet its target of investing $1 billion in the fourth-quarter, its chief executive said on Monday.

By T. Ramavarman

Published: Wed 7 Oct 2009, 12:21 AM

Last updated: Sun 5 Apr 2015, 9:54 PM

“We are working on a number of transactions and that will get me to meet the target. We are working on three targets,” TAQA chief executive, Peter Barker-Homek told reporters without naming the companies.

TAQA has already invested $1.5 billion and plans to continue its buying spree and could spend $1 billion before end-2009, Barker-Homek said earlier.

“We are emphasising on downstream, gas and transmission business,” he said.

Currently, TAQA’s investments are heavily weighted towards the upstream and the company is aiming for balanced growth with 40 per cent in upstream, 40 per cent in downstream and 20 per cent in the midstream, he said after signing five-year IT solution outsourcing contract with Indian IT major Wirpro Limited.

Barker-Homek said TAQA was bullish about revenues in third quarter as oil prices are holding up. “However, the gas prices are worrying,” he said.

TAQA’s total production currently is 160,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day.

“We are doubling Dutch production. In (the) British North sea, production is up by 20 percent this year and our north American portfolio is up by 5 per cent,” he said. Production ending second quarter this year was 138,200 barrels of oil equivalent per day.

The contract signed by Barker-Homek and Anand Sankaran, Chief Executive of Wipro Infotech, on Monday envisages setting up a dedicated state-of-the art facility in Chennai in India to exclusively cater to the requirements of TAQA.

The officials of both the companies declined to give the value of the contract, but said the new facility to be made operational by November 1 will have a 120 IT specialists working in it.

Anand said business from the Middle East region accounted for close to five per cent of the total Wipro operations and was looking forward to achieve 45 per cent growth in revenue from the region this year. Last year the company had 300 per cent growth in business from the region. “‘Even though the IT business in the Middle East region has not been insulated from the impacts of global economic recession, the rate of decline in the region was significantly lower than the rest of the world.’’

He said the company has been looking forward to set up outsourcing centres in the Middle East in countries like Egypt for executing jobs outsourced from companies across the world and not from that country alone.

· ramavarman@khaleejtimes.ae

· With inputs from Reuters