ENGINEERING SERVICES | Forges Tardieu
African Business Network
FORGES TARDIEU Over 160 years of high quality African engineering
ENGINEERING SERVICES | Forges Tardieu
Forges Tardieu as we know it today has roots leading back 167 years ago to 1850. The Mauritian company was formed through a merger between Les Forges et Fonderies de Maurice and Fonderies et Constructions Coloniales. Having begun as a basic mechanical workshop and job shop fabricator to service Africa’s sugar industry, Forges Tardieu has evolved to become an EPC, EPCC and EPCM contractor for some of Africa’s biggest engineering projects across the cane industry, oil & gas, water and waste water treatment, energy and industrial sectors.
The diversification programme was an effort to reduce Forges Tardieu’s exposure to a single industry, so if the oil & gas industry collapsed the company would remain stable through the other divisions. Talking about Forges Tardieu’s entry into the oil & gas industry de Saint Pern says, “We started to penetrate the oil & gas industry with engineering manufacturing services that were not that dissimilar to our core functions in the sugar industry. “Then as we grew in oil & gas we added more specialised engineering services that were industry-specific. We also acquired greater human competence by hiring experts in the field.” The company has organised itself into five separate business clusters each with clearly
Forges Tardieu built up a wealth of expertise
defined responsibilities and objectives. De
in highly specialised mechanical processes
Saint Pern says that it allows each unit to be
through its experience and portfolio in
viewed as experts in its own sector enabling
the sugar cane industry. In the 1980s the
the deployment of individual resources in
company became an engineering group
specific industries.
and diversified into new sectors, adding new engineering services and creating new
Forges Tardieu has evolved to become
companies organically.
a turnkey EPC contractor, in conjunction with the industry conditions. De Saint Pern
“Our main model from the beginning was
says, that while the company sticks to its
to diversify without diluting our expertise,”
core competencies in engineering and high
explains Forges Tardieu’s chief strategy
precision manufacturing, it takes on larger
officer Alexandre Gourel de Saint Pern. “We
projects because the various sectors in Africa,
moved into the new sectors to really diversify
it is now involved in, have changed. There are
our income flow and no longer be dependent
fewer projects but each one is getting bigger
on one specific industry.”
and more complex.
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De Saint Pern adds that the way projects
“Project promoters and owners no longer
are tendered for has also changed and that
want to work with 20 different suppliers, they
involves the EPC contractor accepting a larger
want to work with one main contractor that
portion of responsibility for project delivery.
will overlook the complete civil, mechanical and electrical works and be able to offer
ENGINEERING SERVICES | Forges Tardieu
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two guarantees; the performance guarantee
historically while also entering new sectors.
of the process unit as well as the financial
We have to adapt ourselves and take on
guarantee of the project.”
bigger projects to be more competitive,” de Saint Pern explains.
As head of strategy this transformation into an end-to-end service provider was
Forges Tardieu’s direct competition has
imperative for de Saint Pern. He stresses that
also evolved over the years. Moving from
the company has a responsibility to its 167
domestic African projects to international
year history, shareholders and employees to
locations, as well as large multinationals
ensure its sustainability and keep growing
entering the African market has meant
over the next decades. Particularly in
that Forges Tardieu is no longer competing
oscillating industries like mining and oil &
against local rivals, it is very much a global
gas, where so much is dependent on global
game.
prices and their determinates, the ability to take new opportunities, be reactive to the
“Now, more than 82.7% of our turnover
market and agile is crucial.
comes from our deployment on the African continent. We are competing against huge
“We have to be able to sustain our costs
multinationals that are involved in global
to grow and to grow by remaining in
operations such as Chinese, Indian and
the industries we have been involved in
European groups/companies and so we
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have to be technically savvy, competitive and
“They want to have someone they can revert
better than our rivals in every aspect.”
back to who will insure the entire risk. Forges Tardieu takes the full project management
De Saint Pern explains that the value of
contract and where we are not involved
projects in Africa has ballooned from the
we will subcontract the work and it is us as
tens of millions of dollars range to well over
the EPC/EPCM who takes ownership and
$100 million, that goes for sugar refineries
responsibility for any subcontracts.”
and mills to power plants and the like, “There is a centralisation process in nearly every
Major projects
industry due to economies of scale with
One of the biggest projects Forges Tardieu
respect to cost optimisation.”
has completed recently was the Nakambala sugar factory upgrade in Zambia for British
With more technically and financially complex
Sugar, part of the Illovo Group. Forges
projects, owners want to be able to pass on
Tardieu extended the sugar mill’s raw house
the risk and responsibility to EPC contractors.
and built the sugar refinery. The project
Where there used to be internal project
required the deployment of more than 700
teams interfacing with separate elements
people on site. While the management on
of the supply chain, that role, and the risk
any EPC contract comes from within the
associated, has been transferred to the single
company de Saint Pern explains that it is
major contractor says de Saint Pern.
strategically critical to hire local labour.
ENGINEERING SERVICES | Forges Tardieu
Being based in Mauritius, with a population
company based on its current operating
of around 1.3 million people, limits the
model breaches the 2,000 mark.
amount of internal human resources that can be accessed when needing to deploy 2,000
In the sugar industry Forges Tardieu is
people across several projects throughout
currently working on two major EPC contracts
Africa. Forges Tardieu supplements the
in Southern Sahara as well as a further three
company workforce with contracted local
large distillery projects in Eastern Africa.
labour and imports skilled labour from Asia
In energy, particularly thermal energy, the
or India.
company is working on two major projects to supply energy to sugar mills, one in Mauritius
There are around 600 permanent employees but the project deployment capacity of the
and one in Colombia.
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ENGINEERING SERVICES | Forges Tardieu
The oil & gas division is concentrating on a
new partnership with a major brewing
power plant project in Nigeria as well as on
multinational in view of manufacturing part
a major onshore petroleum terminal facility
of their processing plants need across Africa.
in Mozambique, an EPC project which will commence in the coming weeks.
Restructuring With the company taking on a raft of major
The water and waste water treatment
contracts, the management has implemented
unit is focused mainly on projects across
a top-down reorganisation to manage the
Mauritius, the Maldives and the Seychelles
growth expected in the next couple of years.
while the industrial division is starting a
African Business Network “All of this is to cater for our growth in size.
& waste water) therefore if any business
The services we currently provide together
opportunity presents itself under each of
with those that we develop are like muscles
these specific clusters and/or sectors, then
on a backbone, our backbone being our
Forges Tardieu will be in a position to move
organisational & operating structures
on it.
together with the business model we want to encompass,” says de Saint Pern.
“In worldwide terms we are a small company and we cannot afford to lose time, so we
“If we have several major EPC contracts in
have to be extremely proactive. We are
various industries at the same time we are
defining our red line and we need to adapt
going to drastically increase in size, revenue
it and review it all the time. We need to
and profits. We are expecting things to move
adapt ourselves quickly and be innovative
quickly in the very near future.”
in our approach and service offerings while remaining extremely focused. We cannot
The first phase of restructuring commenced
afford to say let’s wait and see,” notes de
on 1 January 2015 and will be completed at
Saint Pern.
the end of this year. The second phase of the strategic plan to cater for the forecasted
“One way to be proactive is to design the
‘quantum leap’ will begin at the start of 2018.
business clusters in a way where there are several specific branches that are highly
De Saint Pern outlines that the growth so
specialised so that all the synergy links are
far has mainly been organic, with divisions
already there and when the time comes to
and subsidiaries being created from the
offer a new service it will strategically and
holding company to meet the needs of the
operationally fit.
sectors it serves, however as from this year that will move to an acquisitive approach.
“Our structure is flexible, it is like the skeleton
Forges Tardieu is going to be proactive in the
of a baby, it will grow all the time but only
market and pursue opportunities wherever
according to what we feed it. I don’t know the
they arise. The organisation into business
final shape yet and that’s okay. We are just
clusters will facilitate that acquisition and
putting in place all the ingredients for the
joint venture strategy.
structure to be able to grow by itself logically, systematically and intelligently.”
The five clusters will become three wide engineering-focused units across the core pillars. One for manufacturing, one for services and one for trading/integration, positioning themselves in five main sectors (cane, oil & gas, energy, industrial and water
CONTACT http://forgestardieu.com/ +230 206 52 00 admin@forgestardieu.com
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