Saudi Arabia’s largest manufacturer of steel wires and wire-related products National Metal and Manufacturing and Casting Company based in Jubail is looking at enhancing its market position following a merger with two sister companies: Masabic, which operates a foundry plant, and axles maker Mahawer, both located at Dammam’s second industrial city.

The merger decision was taken by National Industrialisation Company (NIC) or Tasnee, the group which owne all the three fims.
National Metal enjoys a turnover of SR200 million ($53.33 million) while the two merging firms have a combined turnover of SR70 million.
Established in 1993, National Metal’s 91,000 sq m manufacturing plant at Jubail Industrial City produces fine quality steel products for business sectors such as construction, appliances, electrical cable, building systems, steel fabrication, furniture and wooden pallet manufacturing, farm equipment, communications, highways, automotives and domestic appliances among others.
National Metal has a capacity to produce more than 60,000 tonnes of wire and wire-related products per year. The company’s product offerings include low relaxation PC wire and PC strand, spring wire, bonnel springs and chassis for mattresses, high and low-carbon galvanised wires, MIG welding wire and flux cored welding wire, the metric and ASTM ranges of hex bolts (carbon steel and stainless steel), self-drilling and self-tapping screws, concrete (masonry) nails and pallet (coated and uncoated) nails and common wire nails.
“National Metal has charted its growth to be amongst the leading regional manufacturers and suppliers of high-quality engineering goods serving the diverse needs of the civil, chemical, metallurgical and electrical industries of the region. In a brief span of 15 years since inception, National Metal has achieved world-class recognition for its product quality, reliability and high service levels,” says Qazi Ebadullah Khan, senior manager of marketing, technical and product development.
Last year, the company undertook a major expansion, adding 30,000 tonnes per year for PC wires and spring wires to its total capacity.
For the value-added fastener products, the company extended the size range for class 4.8 and 8.8 hex bolts from a maximum of M14 diameter to M30 while also adding 304 stainless bolts to the range. Other product additions during the past few years include precision-wound MIG welding wire, flux cored welding wire and wire collated pallet nails.
Besides the regional market of Saudi Arabia, the company also exports to markets in the Middle East, South Asia and Europe. The plant facilities include state-of-the-art European machines, an in-house laboratory and testing facilities, with the company having been re-certified for the ISO 9001:2000 quality system.
“The merger of Masabic and Mahawer with National Metal will further synergise its profitable growth, enable diversification of its product lines, increase market share and its purchasing power, improve productivity and reduce costs, benefit customers and, more importantly, enhance company value to stockholders from its financial and management restructuring,” says Khan.
Established in 1994, Masabic, is considered to be one of the largest and most advanced modern foundry plants in Saudi Arabia with a fully-computerised automatic green sand-moulding line and two induction melting furnaces of three-tonne capacity each. The foundry is equipped to produce a full range of high-quality castings in grey, ductile iron, steel and non-ferrous alloys, matching international standards, with an annual production capacity of 10,000 tonnes to meet the growing demand from pump, valve, pipefitting automobile and agriculture industries.
Apart from of iron and steel melting furnaces, the plant’s facilities also include casting, shot blasting and fettling, heat treatment and a laboratory for chemical analysis equipped with the optical emission vacuum spectrometer, a metallographic examination laboratory for studying microstructures and a mechanical testing laboratory with tensile testers, hardness testers and a charpy impact tester. Other laboratory testing facilities include non-destructive testing with ultrasonic testing unit, magna-flux crack detector, precision metrology equipment and sand testing. Masabic also has its own design and pattern department to develop spare parts.
Mahawer, commercially known as Arabian Axles Manufacturing Company, was incorporated in 1986 with the technical collaboration of Germany-based War Steiner Achsen. It is one of the leading manufacturers of axles for the automotive industry of the region, with the factory is well equipped for the production of high-quality axle bogies used in heavy transport vehicles and trailers.
Discussing the future visions of National Metal, a spokesman says: “It has remained part of our ongoing endeavour to maintain an overall competitive edge through strategic capital investments in machinery acquisitions, modernization and upgrading of our laboratory and testing facilities, new product development along with intensive internal and external training and development of our human resource, which we believe will continue to propel us ahead to face new challenges in the future and provide even better customer service.”