Refining & Petrochemicals Middle East delves on the corporate strategy to understand what really makes the industry’s leaders tick in an interview with Gina Fyffe, CEO, Integra Petrochemicals.
Please brief us on your logistics solutions for the refining and petrochemicals manufacturing industry.
Integra’s business stretches through the petrochemical chain on a global basis from cracker feedstocks, olefins and aromatics through the intermediate chain and methanol into plastics. This means that we need different solutions for different product areas.  Plastics are in many ways the simplest, since silos, warehousing, containers and trucking are widely available.
We store liquids in various terminals in different parts of the world. Our parent company has a fleet of 16 coated chemical tankers plus two stainless steel tankers, but in the trading company, we also charter several hundred voyages each year through our in-house chartering team.
Gases are more complicated due to the lack of third party storage facilities and terminals, particularly on ethylene. This is why there is so much attention at the moment on the possible US ethylene terminals. This would allow, for the first time, large quantities of liquid ethylene to be available to the rest of the market from what is likely to be the lowest cost supply source. This for us is of obvious interest and we are supporting the building of these facilities.
When it comes to gas shipping, we have no owned vessels and prefer to time-charter or contract on term or spot from the market. At our parent company level, we have shareholdings in some of the major gas owners, but this does not affect or influence our trading or chartering decisions, since each group company has to stand on its own feet.
What is your global reach?
We are a global petrochemical trading company founded in 1989 in Europe. We are headquartered in Singapore with trading, operations and chartering hubs in the US and Europe. We have offices in China and South Korea for more than 26 years, and over the last several years, have also opened trading offices in India, KSA and Brazil. This means that we have the time zones covered as well as the main petrochemical regions for all our products.
What are your major achievements in the last three years?
We have grown our business further into Asia and particularly into China. This has brought in enormous benefits to the organisation as a whole and also to our clients. At the same time, we are looking at projects in North America that would not have been possible a few years ago. Our biggest ongoing achievement is that we have a team of people who continue to work enthusiastically for the company and grow through the organisation, training and mentoring the newer team members. This is how our company has thrived and continues to be successful.
What are your immediate expansion plans?
Our parent company is Swiss. So, we have a corporate presence in the country for many years, but we recently opened a trading office there as well, which gives us a further reach. We are looking at asset purchases and terminals in the Middle East as we see the growth possibilities and the need for further development as part of the 2030 vision and growth of the countries in the region.
Integra, however, is not about indiscriminate growth. We remain focused on our core businesses and our key customers. We grow when we see opportunities to improve and develop rather than grow just for the sake of it. This philosophy has served us well for more than 28 years and it will continue to be part of our organisational culture.
