High priority will be given to the employment of Saudis in the $93 million (SR350 million) aluminum plant that is to come up in Bahrah. The Construction Products Holding Company (CPC) of Saudi Arabia and Hermann Gutmann Werke AG of Germany (a member of ALCO Group) signed the agreement here on Saturday. It was signed by Mu'taz Sawwaf, chief executive officer of CPC, and Theodoros Tzortzis, chairman of the board, Hermann Gutmann Werke AG, Germany. “It is an important day for CPC and Gutmann. We are looking at a very long-term commitment from both sides,” Faysal Alaquil, CPC's secretary to the board of directors, and director, business development and administration affairs, told Saudi Gazette after the signing ceremony. “We are looking at a long-term commitment, which means full implementation of the Saudization program. This is very important for us,” Alaquil said, and added that CPC is already in contact with training centers to train Saudis to have them join the technical team. “We are bringing first class state-of-the-art technology from Germany. There is a very big number of Saudis that are eager and interested. We will do our own training and also take help of the Technical and Vocational Training Corporation (TVTC), and other technical training institutes,” he said. Alaquil said that CPC already has a plant in Bahrah, which manufactures system – interlocking systems for windows and doors. “Now we are going into aluminum extrusions. The importance of this plant is for us to introduce aluminum extrusion to the market in Saudi Arabia and the Middle East. The Kingdom will always be the number one market for us. The parts that we will manufacture could be used for windows, and also doors,” he explained. In terms of size and technology it will be the first of its kind in the Kingdom. “The sophisticated equipment will reduce dependence on manpower, but will not affect our Saudization program,” he said. The commissioning of the plant, to be located near the one in Bahrah, will be done by German experts. The foundation and leveling work has already begun. “We are looking at more than 60 percent share of the market because the size is going to be tremendous once we start production,” Alaquil said. Sawwaf said that the work will be carried out in stages. The first stage will involve nearly $60 million. The second stage will be worth $33 million. “The plant will be completed by the end of the year or beginning of 2010 depending on the permits for which we have already applied,” he said. He added that the aluminum market in Saudi Arabia is “very huge, and growing.” He explained that housing takes a big chunk of that. In the coming eight years, about a million houses are to be built and one can imagine the volume of just one item – the aluminum windows – needed for housing alone, besides hospitals, general offices, commercial buildings, shopping centers. Sawwaf said that CPC will be one of the suppliers to the six economic cities coming up in the Kingdom.
