Profile

profile Building bridges with the Middle East

Samar Whitticombe has had a remarkable journey. Born in Iraq, she came over to the UK on a business trip in 1990 at the height of the Gulf War – and has been here ever since.

In August of that year, her soonto-be-husband was not allowed to leave Iraq while Samar was in the UK. Unfortunately, due to the political circumstances she couldn’t get a flight back to Iraq so she spent the following weeks nervously awaiting her husband’s fate. Fortunately, however, the story had a happy ending. In November 1990, Samar’s husband was released and was able to come to the UK, where the pair eventually settled and married.

Samar then embarked on a highly successful career in the UK, starting as an instrument engineer at infrastructure specialist Bechtel UK before going on to join engineering giant Amec Oil & Gas in 2002. While there she worked on a major project to rebuild parts of Iraq, which was in political turmoil due to the invasion of the country by a United States-led coalition that would eventually overthrow Saddam Hussein’s government.

In 2008 Samar established her own company, Somer Industrial Projects (SIP), to use her experience of Iraq to provide training and business development services to companies in the oil, gas and power generation industries. She then won a major contract with Northern Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Governate (KRG) – a contract that provided work not just for her company but also for air conditioning specialist EWA Controls in Isleworth.

From our point of view, we’ll continue to provide skills and resources for projects in the Middle East, and we’ll try to involve other West London companies where we can.

Samar, who has an engineering degree, says: “We were tasked with developing a building management control system for projects in KRG, a system that could control the heating, ventilation and air conditioning plant which serves the offices and the critical electrical switchgear room for the facility.

“Over the years we have worked extensively with EWA Controls, which has more than 30 years’ experience in the field of building automation, and they became a partner for the project. The SIP team, headed by myself, assisted EWA Controls in supplying the system and delivering it in an energyefficient manner. We provided training for local technicians and helped them to gain access to critical data that allowed them to view the status of all of the equipment in a matter of seconds.

“We also worked closely with a local mechanical and electrical contractor to ensure that the client always had a local presence. Initially we had spent a lot of time in Kurdistan Iraq to ensure we built up a rapport with the client. It’s vital to build trust in any client relationship and we did that with KRG.

“Our UK team created the workplan for the manufacture of the control panels, their testing and the software generation. All of this was done before the equipment was exported from the UK, using a West London-based

At site with EWA - the UK contractor from Feltham and Choman the Local Contracting Company

shipping firm that provided truck transport all the way to Kurdistan Iraq. EWA Controls provided the control panels and we carried out the system design to ensure that all project safety aspects were covered and that the system itself was designed and built to be fail-safe.”

Samar believes that this project is a great example of international collaboration between overseas firms and local companies in Hounslow borough. With the end of the Brexit transition period looming large on the horizon, companies may need to look further afield than Europe when exporting their products and services.

“It’s important that local companies consider a range of different export markets,” says Samar. “Kurdistan Iraq offers a wealth of opportunities, especially in the oil, gas, infrastructure and power generation markets, and the country is open to working with firms in the UK.

“From our point of view, we’ll continue to provide skills and resources for projects in the Middle East, and we’ll try to involve other West London companies where we can. The borough of Hounslow has a diverse array of businesses that can really add value on projects such as the one we’ve been working on with KRG.”

A board member of Hounslow Chamber of Commerce, Samar was awarded a Women of Excellence Award in 2017 for her work with communities. The following year, she was elected executive member of al Kindi society of engineering.

She says: “I’m determined to continue working with UK Trade & Investment (UKTI) and other organisations to build bridges between West London and the Middle East. The current business environment is challenging due to COVID-19 but opportunities are still out there. We just have to exploit them.”