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Congratulations 50th Class of AAAS Science &Technology Policy Fellows

Congratulations to 50th Class of AAAS Science &Technology Policy Fellows assigned to Capitol Hill and placed in agencies and offices.  Elisabeth Deeb is one of 31 legislative Fellows placed on Capitol Hill. For 50 years, Fellows have helped mold the policies that have ushered in a new era of technological progress, from advancements in clean energy and standards development to policies focused on strengthening manufacturing capabilities and supply chains.

For more information, please see:  https://www.aaas.org/news/50th-class-aaas-st-policy-fellows-embarks-upon-year-service?mkt_tok=NjQ5LUlPUS04MzAAAAGHLtm_v-RpgbwtoS3ipoVzpDhdJ2t7DyupVzs9WjxcC7fcLeJ-9UP0Tz4RLi5yqoZO0RUABv82OptulHJqbMYsH-FULL3JAKLnLb7S_ab0


ESG and Localization

Investors, regulatory agencies, and companies are focusing on  ESG in order to manage and measure sustainable long term business performance and investment potential.  Companies that can demonstrate Environmental Social Governance (ESG) performance are showing increased revenues, higher returns, and greater investment attraction.  Delivering on ESG is good for business.

The S in ESG is the social impact criteria and consists of practices that benefit the employees, consumers, suppliers, and the community.  In his article in ISMWorld.com, Shaun Doherty provides an excellent explanation on how localization programs are an effective and sustainable ESG strategy. Well designed localization programs encourage companies to invest in their employees, suppliers and communities in a way that is sustainable, good for the company’s business and deliver cost savings and a return on investment.

T&M Associates designs and helps clients implement highly successful localization programs that deliver on ESG performance.  Working together with our clients, our programs have delivered benefits to all stakeholders, from governments, to the sponsoring companies, to the local workforce and local companies (including small and medium enterprises).  These localization programs resulted in significant growth of local enterprises, as well as significant increases in meaningful local employment and workforce development.  And by delivering a positive return on investment for the sponsoring entity, the programs insured their sustainability and continued growth for many years.

For the article on ESG and Localization, please click on this link:  ISM Insights_ ESG and Localization


iktva in Review: Localizing Commercial Ecosystems

Since 2015, the iktva program identified not only supply chain gaps, but also significant potential business opportunities. Since 2015, iktva has achieved:

  • Creation of 180 business opportunities with a potential market demand of ~ $15B per year
  • A 50% annual growth in local SMEs
  • 94 new agreements with a combined value of $29B, resulting in 34 new local manufacturers
  • 63% local content in KSA (up from a localized-supply baseline level of 35% in 2015).

For the first time, Saudi Arabia is manufacturing flaring equipment and nonmetallic rebar and many other products and services.

“iktva is helping to create a stronger, more diversified and more resilient Saudi economy, with a fourfold rise in spend on local research and development …”

These milestones were reviewed in Aramco Elements Magazine. For the full article: https://bit.ly/3ATEJk5

and in the most recent CEO speech:  https://www.aramcolife.com/en/publications/the-arabian-sun/articles/2023/week-05-articles/speech-ceo-at-iktva-forum

 


Supply Chain Resilience: Beyond the Data

T&M Associates’ localization program helps our clients develop, grow, diversify, and optimize their supply chains, and our clients have seen the benefit of their resilient supply chain ecosystems during the pandemic. Supply chain disruptions, such as those caused by the pandemic, war, or the 2008 financial crisis, have exposed the vulnerabilities and critical pinch points of global supply chains.  During these events, companies experienced difficulties obtaining materials, especially from offshore suppliers, delivery times increased, quality decreased, and many suppliers went out of business.  Companies had to weather the impact of shut-downs, slow-downs, and labor shortages of their lean supply.  Additional disruptions were caused by logistics, from availability and cost of shipping containers to disruptions at receiving or shipping ports, … These events have encouraged companies and governments to promote supply chain redundancies and resiliency.  However, digitization and data analytics are just one part of the solution and increasing the buffer capacity by maintaining large inventories is a short-term solution.  The risk of maintaining large inventories is that once the logistics issues ease, there may be global overcapacity. The cost of maintaining large inventories or other supply chain redundancies may make the products too expensive in the long term. This raises the questions: how can industries or supply chains be made more resilient and/ or how can we grow sustainable supply chain ecosystems?

T&M Associates has developed a Value Addition/local content framework to help our clients develop, grow, diversify, and optimize their supply chains.  Our programs are supported by proprietary systems and processes designed to meet the needs of our clients.   Digitization and data analytics are just one part of this framework; they are tools used to provide information to make business decisions. By themselves, data analytics do not grow supply chain ecosystems.  The output of our program provides clients with a portfolio of opportunities and a list of activities targeting short-, mid- and long-term development and investment opportunities.

“We have seen a lot of plants and factories and suppliers that support Saudi Aramco from Europe, including China and other places – they had to shut down because of the lockdown. That impacted us for a while. But because of the optimum level of inventory that we have and because of our in-Kingdom total value add, which is our local content – we are at 56% so a lot of things are being manufactured in the Kingdom – it helped us a lot.” Quote by Saudi Aramco CEO Amin Nasser in Oil&Gas, June 2020.

Over the last decade, T&M Associates developed and executed the leading in-country value addition program, recognized by the IFC and World Petroleum Council Excellence Awards in Social Responsibility and especially our clients. Our programs are sustainable and continue long after our participation ends.  Our programs have developed hundreds of supply chain ecosystems to support our clients’ industries, generated billions in new revenue for local companies, created 1000’s of new jobs, and 10’s of millions of USD in new investment.


Saudi Aramco’s iktva Program Helped Battle the Pandemic

Mohammad A. Al Shammary, VP Procurement & Supply Chain Management at Saudi Aramco, discusses the impact of iktva on the pandemic, and how localization helps build resilience in Oil&Gas.  The full Press Release can be read here:  O&G Aramco iktva Mar 2021

Saudi Aramco CEO credits iktva with helping to build resilience before the pandemic.  The Oil&Gas Press Release can be read here: O&G iktva and Covid Jul 2020


Leveraging Value Add Programs to Support Economic Recovery

Webinar Presented by AmCham Abu Dhabi

AmCham Abu Dhabi in collaboration with ADNOC, ALDAR and Etihad hosted a live webinar on Wednesday Nov. 18th, 2020  on ” Leveraging Value Add Programs to Support Economic Recovery”.

Moderator:   Dr. Tom Deeb, VP, T&M Associates.

Panelists:

  • Mona Ahmed Balalaa: Manager ICV Execution ADNOC
  • Sultan Almheiri: Local Content Manager Sourcing & Procurement Etihad Airways
  • Kim Schofield: Founder and Managing Partner O2K Limited
  • Leya Al Damani: VP Sustainability Department Procurement ALDAR

 

 

 


Opportunities in Oil & Gas in the Middle East

Danish Export Association Member Conference

In September 2019, Elisabeth Deeb, T&M Associates, was invited to present “Opportunities in Oil & Gas in the Middle East” at the Danish Export Association Member Conference in Esbjerg, Denmark.


World Economic Forum on Economic Development

T&M Associates was an invited author and reviewer for World Economic Forum on Economic Development, Chapter 10. Stimulating Broader Social and Economic Development from Natural Resources. This book was published as a part of the WEF on-going work to help countries maximize the value they create from their natural resources. Read More