African Fusion

November 2015

AFRICAN FUSION

Welding and cutting

t an openday heldon 29 September,

Efficient Engineering’s managing

director, Graham Hartley, says that,

withstanding plunging commodity

prices and resulting slowing demand,

the company continues to be part of

the solution within the South African

steel industry, which plays a critical role

in mineral beneficiation and is a key

enabler of every part of the economy.

The top five steel consuming industries

include the automotive, mining; con-

struction, energy, and infrastructure

sectors, which jointly contribute 15%

of total South African GDP and employ

more than 8-million people.

Through developing its own intel-

lectual property in the areas of custom

engineering mining solutions, pressure

vessels andmodular solutions, Efficient

Engineering continues to diversify its

business. The company has gone from

purelymechanical design andmanufac-

ture, to including electrical design, and

full integration, installation and testing

ofmodular power control, electro-hous-

es andgenerator sets. Efficient Power, an

Efficient Group that was launched only

18 months ago, has since turned over

more than R100-million.

“We offer first tomarket, tailormade

solutions to our clients through the ex-

pertise of ourmanagement team, which

has more than 200 years’ cumulative

experience in harnessing contemporary

machinery and industry leading manu-

facturing processes.

“This has led to our robust growth

and has seen us evolve froma respected

family business to becoming the pre-

ferred supplier for numerous blue chip

original equipment manufacturers in

the local and international mining and

material handling; oil and gas; satellite

communication and radio astronomy;

petrochemical; as well as engineering

industries. Further, we continue to add

to our diverse portfolio through acquisi-

tions such as that of Trotech, a division

recentlypurchased through thebusiness

rescue process.”

Trotech, nowknown as Efficient Tro-

tech, offers specialist services in the field

of engineering, design,manufacture and

installation of bulk storage tanks, pres-

sure vessels, heat exchangers, reactors,

air receivers and fired heaters to the

petrochemical, mining and minerals

industry, as well as to the pulp and

paper sectors. It is an exciting addition

Efficient Engineering’s current flagship project is

for the Meerkat antennas for the Square Kilometre

Array project (SKA). The company is completing

the fabrication and full electrical and mechanical

integration of the yokes and pedestals for the first 64

Meerkat antennas.

Efficient Engineering’s diversified strategy

Graham Hartley, MD of Efficient Engineering

(centre) with Warwick Jackson of Efficient Power

(left) and Vees Moodley of Efficient Trotech (right)

photographed at the open day event.

A fabrication of a dragline bucket on display at Efficient Engineering’s open day.

to Efficient Engineering, which currently

boasts total manufacturing space of

21 600 m

, making if fully equipped to

undertake any engineering job, regard-

less of its size or complexity.

At Efficient Engineering, equipment

is fabricated toworld-class standards by

a hand-picked teamof production staff,

many of whomarehighly skilledartisans

and metalworkers. This is essential to

maintaining the requirements that allow

the company to retain its ISO 9001:2008

certification, year after year. The com-

pany is also ISO 3834 certified as well as

OHSAS 1801:2007 compliant.

Abenchmarkaudit conductedby the

United Nations Industrial Development

Organisation’s (UNIDO) Subcontracting

Partnership Exchange (SPX) programme

resulted in an outstanding outcome.

Under the category of Overall Perfor-

mance and Practices Matrix, Efficient

Engineering was placed in the ‘world

class’ quadrant, along with only a few

other international group companies

operating in the same league.

Also, the prestigious SAISC Steel

Awards recognised Efficient Engineer-

ing, its partners and client as overall

winners this year for their work on the

SKA Africa Radio Antenna Positioner

project. The judges said that this project

‘radiates excellence not only in the use

of structural steel but in every aspect of

its structure and purpose.’

“This is testament to our commit-

ment to being a partner of choice to our

clients aswell as good corporate citizens

– by contributing towards the growth of

the economy through world class solu-

tions that benchmark South Africa against global

industry standards,” concludes Hartley.