Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil-exporting company, plans to expand its localisation initiative to drive investment into the domestic economy as it looks to branch out into new sectors.
The programme, known as In-Kingdom Total Value Add, or IKTVA, will be expanded to include new international partnerships. It will help establish companies through an industrial investment programme linked to Aramco’s business.
“These new partnerships will contribute to advancing innovation, sustainability and enhance the scale of reliability in our business ecosystem and, in addition, benefit companies operating in the kingdom’s vast energy and chemicals sector,” said Amin Nasser, Saudi Aramco president and chief executive.
He said the partnerships will have a strong focus on new technology and will maximise investment in “non-metallic materials and [the] circular economy”.
The programme will also focus on development of the national workforce in communities in which the company operates.
Aramco signed preliminary agreements with Shell and Dutch company AMG Recycling, China's Suzhou XDM, Shen Gong, Xinfoo and Supcon, and South Korea’s Posco.
The new collaborations will be in steel-plate manufacturing, industrial 3D printing, energy management, recycling and chip production.
Since the launch of IKTVA, the local manufacturing component required by Aramco from its partners rose to 56 per cent in 2019, compared with 35 per cent in 2015.
Posco will jointly evaluate the possibility of constructing an integrated steel-plate manufacturing plant in the kingdom.
Shell and AMG Recycling will look to collaborate on the recycling of gasification ash and reclamation of spent catalyst, in addition to other sustainable solutions.
Suzhou XDM will focus on industrial 3D printing while Shen Gong will focus on developing technology for LED lighting, energy management and intelligent control.
Xinfoo and Supcon will look at opportunities in chip production and manufacturing, respectively.
