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Zulfikar

Director, Orchid Petrochem FZC

As the market conditions were evolving recently, we decided to set up a distillation unit to operate as a mini-refinery to produce petroleum and solvent specialty products after receiving approvals from the Hamriyah Free Zone Authority. The plant currently holds a production capacity of 144,000 tons per annum, and we are expecting to reach at least 70% of production capacity by the next year. In the coming years, we expect to reach 85-90% capacity. We have separated plant operations into two categories. One is producing solvent specialty products to be used in various industries, including paints and coating, printing, fertilizer, water treatments and oil field among others. The other unit will be dedicated for producing petroleum products. By doing this, we aim to develop our core competencies with right positioning. We plan to sell our products locally and export to countries in South Asia, MENA, and Africa. Because we depend on the GCC for supply sources, we decided to set up the manufacturing unit in Hamriyah Free Zone. Storage is an integral part of any production or refining unit because without a storage backup we cannot help refining activities. In terms of logistics support, we have excellent infrastructure, and the market is well matured. Hamriyah Free Zone is the right strategic location.

Satyabrata Mukherjee

Vice-President of Operations & Projects, Hazel International

Due to the insufficient tank storage at our sister company, McGraw Global, we created a new facility called Hazel International and are currently building 30 new tanks for this company at an investment of USD127 million. We will use these new tanks to store our own products and other companies’ products as well, operating as a third-party storage facility. Our new tank terminal will be ready in September 2017 and will be able to store any product from petrochemicals to gas, oil, and bitumen. The terminal also has tanker loading, drumming, and process distillation/refinery facilities. Our terminal is suitable for both petrochemical and petroleum products, no one else has this capability here; they do either one or the other but not both. These facilities clubbed with refining capability make us an indomitable force. The Hamriyah Free Zone in Sharjah also provides us with many advantages. In addition to the zero import and export duties, there is more room in Sharjah than in Abu Dhabi or Dubai. Also, our main customers are the paint manufacturing companies, and they are located in Sharjah.

Prerit Goel

Group Director, Prerit Goel

We are a USD3.2-billion top-line global company, and 80% of this comes from our operations in the UAE. Our total storage is about 1 million cbm and a large part of it is in Fujairah, where we can hold 412,000cbm. Then we have two terminals in Hamriyah with a combined capacity of about 250,000cbm and another 250,000 in Gujarat, India. About 20% of the storage is given to third-party customers while 30% is used by our in-house trading company for our own use. Part of this is used for physical bunkering supplies for fueling ships in all the UAE ports. We also have a refining unit here in the Hamriyah Free Zone that does about 5,000bpd of refining. With the terminal that we built in Sharjah we are now one of the largest terminal players in the Emirate. In terms of technological sophistication in Sharjah, we are the most modern and efficient privately owned terminals. In Fujairah as well, we have one of the largest and most sophisticated terminals among several large players occupying that port. In terms of market share, we again focus on the local market following our recent expansion into the global one.

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