Engr. Obi Uzu is the Managing Director of Global Process and Pipeline Services Limited (GPPSL). He has over 25 years of oil field experience, covering a wide spectrum of technical areas such as drilling operation, production technology, as well as process and pipeline services, which has seen him supervised many successful projects in Nigeria, America and the UK. In this exclusive chat, he speaks with Yange Ikyaa about the success stories of his company, which is 100 per cent indigenous, and his desire to extend the company’s services beyond Nigeria and replicate its successes in other parts of Africa. Excerpts:
What exactly does your company specialize in?
Our company is 100 per cent a local (indigenous) company, which is called Global Process and Pipeline Services. We do two major things where we render our services, and that is pre-commissioning of facilities and piping, and we also do maintenance of those facilities as they are aging.
We are 100 per cent local company as I told you, and now, we have built enough capacity which is recognized nationwide. We won this NIS Award three times consecutively and then, in 2022, we won African Energy Company of the Year for the whole of Africa. So, we have realized that this is the best time to export the beautiful stories that we are known for here in Nigeria in terms of capacity, process capability and track record, and that is to put it in a nutshell.
Talk to us specifically about the projects that you are working on currently
Yeah, I may not be able to mention all of those projects in detail because we are working for a lot of clients, which I haven’t got the approval to talk about in public, but I am going to tell you about what we do as a company.
You know, like the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) Plant, we have been maintaining it for the past seven years, we have our crew there working currently. We also have crew on some of the FPSOs (floating production, storage and offloading vessels) in Nigeria working for the IOCs (international oil companies). We play at the deep water, which is the far end of the technology, so all the resources we use or deploy are owned by us 100 per cent. That makes it different in the sense that we don’t have partnerships on which we depend to execute most of these jobs in-country.
Talking about intra-Africa trade as you mentioned, how are you going to export this excellence to African neighbours?
Yeah, among the African countries, the boundaries or borders pose a major challenge, and that is why we are talking about the level of policymaking too, in terms of the question of how we can break these borders so that for a job in Equatorial Guinea, you wouldn’t need to mobilize it in France, you don’t need to mobilize it from Aberdeen, but you can utilize or leverage Nigeria, which is just four hours to Equatorial Guinea. Those are the issues to look at very critically.
I don’t know, honestly, because that is beyond me as a service provider to know how Equatorial Guinea or Ghana can accommodate me to come and bring the value into their oil and gas economy. It is just like somebody who has closed his door and how he or she is going to open it for you to bring food to him or her, it is not what I can stay here and tell you how I am going to do it. It’s only the person who is inside that can decide how the door will be opened, but not you who are bringing anything from outside.
I was talking with someone that does similar things to what you do during the SAIPEC, he complained about the greed of prospective partners from other African nations who demand up to 70 percent profit share, even when you are the one bringing all the money and equipment to offer service in their countries. Is that also your experience?
It is not. What it is actually is to show them that you are bringing food, you are bringing value, and they may have a way to accommodate you satisfactorily. There is no way I will bring all these resources and you will take 70 per cent, it’s not going to happen. So, if a partner doesn’t want such an offer, how can it happen? You now try to strike a balance, either by having in-country investors, who will bring money and you are going to use that money to offset the cost of some of this equipment.
How can you compare your experience in pre- and post-PIA implementation?
The PIA has just been passed and the impact has not really sieved through into the industry yet, to be honest with you. I don’t know, I haven’t seen the impact yet, you know, but what we envisage is that it is going to increase efficiency and reduce cost because wastage will be reduced. The customer who wants to use our services will be based on value that we are bringing, or value addition. That is in terms of what they are also going to get but not because somebody from a superior authority is recommending me and it can be awarded to me at any price, and those are the differences.