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November 2015
MODERN MINING
49
CONSULTANTS/
PROJECT HOUSES
feature
Fluor – one of the world’s most admired companies
Founded just over a century ago when a family of Swiss immigrants set up a construc
tion company in the western US, Fluor is now headquartered in Irving, Texas, but has a
truly international presence with more than 40 000 employees worldwide. In FY 2014
it recorded earnings of US$715 million on revenues of US$21,5 billion.
Over its history it has been involved with some of world’s most iconic engineering
projects including the Manhattan project in the 1940s, the construction of the Trans-
Alaska oil pipeline in the 1970s and, since 2003, the reconstruction of Iraq. It is widely
regarded as one of the world’s leading engineering groups and for four years in a row
(2012 to 2015) has taken the top spot in ‘Fortune’ magazine’s annual survey of the
World’s Most Admired Companies.
The company has a long history in Southern Africa, dating back to 1960 when it
was awarded its first contract by Sasol. It went on to work – as managing contrac
tor – on both the Sasol Two and Three projects in Secunda. It recently signed a
three-year collaboration agreement with Sasol which will see the two companies
collaborating on a range of projects as an integrated team at Sasol’s facilities in
Secunda and Sasolburg.
Pictured at the unveiling
of the plaque during the
official opening of the
Fluor Botswana office
in Gaborone are (from
left): Andries Bester,
Country Manager of Fluor
Botswana, Joe McAneny,
Senior Vice President,
Global Project Execution,
Fluor Corporation, and
Charles Siwawa, CEO of
the Botswana Chamber of
Mines.
been doing this intern training in partnership
with Debswana for three years now and this
is something that we can also offer to other
clients.”
While Fluor has done well in the mining
field in Botswana, all its work thus far has
been for Debswana. “The challenge for me as
Country Manager is to secure other clients in
the mining industry and, beyond that, to gen-
erally diversify our activities in Botswana to
avoid an over-reliance on the resource sector,”
says Bester. “The country has some substantial
infrastructural projects in the pipeline in areas
such as power generation, energy and chemi-
cals, railways and water supply and Fluor has a
fantastic track record in all these fields.
“Obviously, we’re a small office currently
but Fluor’s motto is ‘Local capabil-
ity, Global Strength’ – which means
that we can take on projects of any
size as we can draw on Fluor’s global
expertise and resources. In practice,
though, we’ll mainly be backed by the
South African office, which now has
a full engineering design capability,
in addition to the procurement and
project execution skills which it has
always had.”
Bester emphasises that Fluor
Botswana needs to grow and diversify
its business. “This is an independent
office dedicated to serving Botswana
and the idea is that it will be a self-
sustaining profit centre manned
primarily by employees who are
Botswana citizens,” he says. “In addi-
tion, part of our strategy will be to
develop local suppliers and contractors to the
maximum possible extent.”
A mechanical engineer by training (he has
a BSc Eng degree from Stellenbosch), Bester
worked earlier in his career for MegChem and
then for the Aveng group. He has extensive
experience in project management and has
led several projects through from the planning
stage to implementation and commissioning.
Apart from South Africa and Botswana, he
has worked in a number of African countries
including Nigeria, Ghana, the DRC, Zambia,
Namibia, Malawi and Mozambique. He
joined Fluor South Africa in 2011 as Head of
Engineering but over the past three years has
been mainly focused on Fluor’s contracts in
Botswana.