Saudi-based Zamil Steel Industries (ZSI) - a global leader in the manufacture of pre-engineered steel buildings (PEB) segment - has won a QR35.8 million ($9.6 million) contract that will involve the supply and erection of the steel building for Qatar's latest landmark retail, sports and entertainment centre.

Work on the 100,000 sq m development - Le Villaggio - which began in January, is scheduled for completion by May next year with a soft opening slated to take place by October 2005. Amana Steel Building Contracting Company, ZSI's certified builder in Qatar, has been awarded the erection of this prestigious project, says a spokesman for the company.
Located in Doha's Al Azizya district, and situated within a new sports complex surrounding Khalifa Stadium, Le Villaggio will feature a total built-up area of 145,000 sq m and once completed, will be Qatar's largest shopping centre offering a comprehensive, yet focused mix of major retail outlets, services and entertainment activities. These will include bowling, a fun park, a roller-coaster, ice rink, a six-theatre cinema, fast food outlets and restaurant areas, a hotel and a hypermarket. These will be set within and around an 'evocative colosseum' and each of the elements will be linked together by water features, such as an indoor canal and a lake.
The exterior design will reflect an Italian hill town in form, scale, materials and colour, while the interior plan is an organic curvilinear form, which uses a street metaphor to unite and connect variously themed elements and districts that will be joined together by a circuit of specially-decorated street themes.
'In practical terms, this means a very complicated curved architecture, which necessitates the use of a mix of building materials incorporating concrete and steel,' says Maher Mootassem, project manager of Business Trading Company, the developer of the project.
ZSI's involvement in this project relates to the construction of the entertainment and department store areas as well as the hypermarket site and a three-dome decorative structure.
'These will be constructed using a PEB system, since this material will produce a finished product with large unobstructed areas as per our requirements,' he says.
Instead of using concrete, precast or structural steel materials as the main structural system normally associated with such projects, ZSI offered a solution that combined a PEB system with open web joists and decking panels.
'This provides increased versatility, flexibility and a more value-engineered system and revolutionises the traditional PEB system,' says the spokesman. 'This solution will produce a massive clear building span of 92 m - a record throughout the Middle East, Asia, Africa and Europe using a PEB system.'
Overall, more than 15,000 sq m of mezzanine steel beams, open web joists, Hambro composite joists and steel floor deckings will be used in the project. Also included are some 1,600 m of suspended steel supports, which will act as frames for the chilled water pipes as well as the facade of segment sheeting which will create a wall transition for the high structure lobby area between the various shop areas.
'This ambitious undertaking has posed significant supply challenges which have been overcome by the use of a PEB system. An example is the need to create 32 areas interlinked with each other even though they have differing spans, module and height configurations,' adds Ihab Al Ramlawi, Amana Steel's business development manager.
The three-domed structure will cover an approximate floor area of 100,000 sq m and will feature some 8,000 tonnes of steel plus 115,000 sq m of Zamil Steel's insulated sandwich panels (Tempcon). The spans of the domes will range from 27 to 38 m in diameter and their shapes and heights will vary from 22 to 32 m from the finished floor level of the building.
Elaborating on the other features of the project, Ramlawi says: 'The ice rink area will feature a 92-m clear span with an eave height of approximately 15 m, and the roller-coaster area will have a 67 m clear span area and an approximate eave height of 23 m.'
A dedicated team of 16 groups of erectors, lead men, a site engineer, foremen, a surveyor, and an erection coordinator, headed by an erection manager, will oversee the erection of the project. The erection procedure also includes locating and leasing long-term heavy equipment such as cranes, telehandlers, forklifts and scissor lifts as well as defining the erection method relating to specialised structures, he says.
'We awarded this project to Zamil Steel since it is the largest and most trusted name in the PEB segment in Qatar and with Amana as its certified and exclusive builder in the country, the value offering includes an unsurpassed level of technical knowledge and focused experience in constructing architecturally oriented pre-engineered steel buildings,' says Mootassem. 'The selection of ZSI also took into consideration the very successful work that they undertook with Amana for the Landmark Shopping Mall, one of Business Trading Company's earlier projects in Qatar.'
Founded in 1977, ZSI is a global leader in the manufacture of PEBs and the Middle East's premier supplier of steel structures, transmission and telecommunications towers, open web steel joists and floor deckings. The company's products are marketed in more than 70 countries through an extensive network of 50 sales offices, 59 certified builders and 27 agents and distributors.
ZSI - one of three sector businesses of Zamil Industrial Investment Company (ZIIC) - has its main factories in Dammam First and Second Industrial Cities, and has additional factories located in Egypt and Vietnam. More than 400 engineers are employed in its engineering departments in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt, Vietnam and India.
Established in 1998, ZIIC is headquartered in Dammam, and employs 5,000 people in 50 countries.
As an international manufacturing and fabrication group, it provides leading air-conditioning, PEBs, structural steel products, transmission towers, open web joists and decks, and architectural glass processing solutions to meet the requirements of the global construction industry through its three sector businesses: Zamil Air Conditioners, Zamil Steel Industries and Zamil Glass Industries.
Says a spokesman for the company: 'ZIIC exports to more than 75 markets and derives 40 per cent of revenues from outside the kingdom. For the year ended December 31, 2003, net profits after Zakat contributions reached SR50.3 million ($13.4 million), a growth of 11 per cent over 2002 (SR45.2 million). ZIIC's shares have been actively traded on the Saudi equity market since early 2002.'