Dubai woos Tiruchi fabrication units

DEWA to facilitate SMEs to register themselves as vendors in Dubai

Dawood Khan Jawahar Ahamed, right, senior engineer (contracts), DEWA, making a presentation in Tiruchi on Tuesday on business opportunities forSMEs in Dubai. Photo: A. Muralitharan

With fabrication units of Tiruchi beginning to explore business opportunities in Dubai, the State-run Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) has come forward to facilitate the small and medium enterprises to register themselves as vendors in Dubai and also provide match-making services for the SMEs.

Representatives of DEWA, who visited the city for an interaction with BHELSIA members in November last year, are here again to take forward the discussions. A delegation of BHEL Small Industries Association (BHELSIA) had also visited Dubai recently to explore opportunities .

Both the organisations are of the view that fabrication units could tap direct and indirect business opportunities in Dubai. Briefing reporters here on the discussions, Dawood Khan Jawahar Ahamed, senior engineer (contracts), DEWA, said fabrication units of Tiruchi could supply equipment for power generation, power and water transmission, renewable energy, oil and gas, desalination plants, and a host of other fields.

His organisation would support the fabrication units in not only registering themselves as vendors online but also provide match-making services to help them become sub-contractors for DEWA’s main vendors.

Dubai was now going in for a 2 x 600 MW clean coal technology power plant and 1 x 100 MW solar power plants. The country will also ramp up its power generation capacity ahead of Expo 2020. “We are looking at suppliers in Tiruchi for its cost competitiveness and quality in fabrication,” he said.

“Our vendor registration process is very simple and can be done online from here. We do not have a system of approved vendors and anybody with expertise to supply quality material can register themselves.

Unique codes will be assigned within two days and evaluation will be purely on merit,” Mr.Ahamed said. Mr.Ahamed said that DEWA would help BHELSIA in exploring opportunities in countries other than Dubai in West Asia and elsewhere. “We are here for a long-term association,” he affirmed.

M.Srinivasan, president, BHELSIA, said after long years of being dependent on the public sector major BHEL, fabrication units in Tiruchi are now ready to explore opportunities abroad. “We have built the capacity and expertise. We have learnt from our visit to Dubai that we can do business from here. Given our cheap and qualified labour, we can still be competitive by exporting,” he said.