Following a string of significant milestones and with the imminent launch of a massive five-year expansion plan, Saudi Readymix, the leading manufacturer and supplier of readymixed concrete and related products in Saudi Arabia, is laying the groundwork necessary to further strengthen its market position through acquiring additional quarries to exercise better control over its supply chain of aggregates in terms of reliability of supply and quality control.

Since January last year, the company has acquired two new quarries, bringing the number of quarries it now owns to three, a significant number for Saudi Arabia. The combined daily production rate for the three quarries is expected to be around 4,000 to 5,000 cu m of aggregates in all sizes. The move follows a record production year, which saw the company produce 3 million cu m of concrete last year.
With a production target of 4 million cu m for this year, and in anticipation of the mega projects planned in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia such as the Jubail 2 expansion, Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority’s (Sagia) Ras Al Zour and Saudi Aramco’s Manifa projects, the push towards a more reliable supply of aggregates was a strategic move to put the company in a better position to deal with the construction boom.
“In addition to ensuring a steady supply of raw materials for our growing operations, owning our own quarries allows us to impose and maintain our stringent quality control policy over more sections of our supply chain. As we enter into a rapid phase of expansion and growth, maintaining our quality becomes more and more difficult, so we feel this move is essential to us, and we will continue to look for ways to improve it and deliver only the best products to our clients,” says Rami Khalid Alturki, president of Saudi Readymix.
“Mega projects valued at more than SR1.3 trillion ($350 billion) have been launched in the kingdom. We anticipate that due to the size and tight scheduling of these projects, there will be a tremendous strain on most raw materials, especially aggregates. Consequently, contractors working on these projects will be more demanding than usual in terms of reliability of supply and quality of service. Our goal is to provide our customers a turnkey ‘peace of mind’ experience and assure them reliable uninterrupted delivery,” he adds.
Currently, 24 trailers transport aggregates from the company’s three quarries to its plants in the eastern and central regions of Saudi Arabia, each of which has its own shaded stock bay that can house anywhere from 500 to 2000 cu m of aggregates. Each trailer makes two to three deliveries daily, yet because of the surge in demand for concrete, this amount is only enough to supply 30 to 40 per cent of the total aggregates the company needs. However, as the company looks to open new plants in new areas of the kingdom such as the southern and northern regions, plans to either acquire or open new quarries in these regions are currently being studied through feasibility studies performed by the company’s technical and finance departments.
In the readymix concrete world, a reliable supply chain of raw materials is undeniably vital. Supply unreliability causes concrete production to slow down and even cease, which in turn leads to missed deadlines, escalating costs, ultimately causing the work relationship between the contractors and concrete suppliers to turn sour or even come to an end. Because readymixed concrete companies normally rely on many suppliers for the materials they need, control over the supply chain becomes all the more important.
Saudi Arabia has a wide variety of rock formations that vary from region to region, thus requiring different methods of extraction. The aggregates extracted from the Eastern Province, for example, are composed of sedimentary rock that was formed hundreds of thousands of years later than the rock found in other regions in the kingdom, says a spokesman for Saudi Readymix.
“And while extracting using dynamite is normally a much faster process than using conventional methods such as bulldozers and rock breakers, the relatively young age of this rock contains large pockets of air cavities that absorb the impact of detonations, thus rendering dynamite ineffective. Saudi Readymix’s quarries in Al Nu’airiyah and Abu Hadriyah are located in regions which produce such aggregates,” he adds.
The central region contains sedimentary rock that is much older, and thus had time to become tightly compact due to geological forces. Using dynamite in quarries located in these regions, such as Saudi Readymix’s Al Summan quarry, is quite effective and blasts away a much larger quantity of rocks in one go, making this technique much more cost effective, he points out.
“The readymixed concrete market in Saudi Arabia is highly fragmented, with very few barriers to entry, as evidenced by the numerous instances of quarry owners setting up their own readymixed concrete plants and vice versa. Also, there have been some advances by some large readymixed concrete suppliers from outside the kingdom looking to gain a slice of the Saudi construction pie. This fragmentation and intense competition places increasing pressure on concrete suppliers to find ways to differentiate themselves from others.
“Saudi Readymix’s main strength stems from its high regard among other readymixed concrete suppliers in terms of quality. It is widely regarded as the industry’s benchmark in this aspect, which is something the company takes great pride in and strives to maintain. This commitment to delivering only the highest quality concrete to its clients naturally requires using only the highest quality raw materials and this is where the decision to vertically integrate its supply chain shows its real importance, allowing the company to exercise more quality control over its operations to maintain its position.
“The company spares no effort in backing up its claim of complete quality control by following the ASTM 33 standards that regulate aggregate specifications. For example, daily, weekly, and monthly aggregate samples are collected from the stockpiles at the quarries and sent to the company’s central laboratory located in the Dammam Industrial City where a full battery of tests is performed on the samples to ensure that only the highest quality materials are used in its concrete mixes. The testing range extends from basic requirements such as sieve analysis to more complex issues such as abrasion resistance, chemical soundness, specific gravity, absorption, and chloride and sulphate content, to name but a few,” he points out.
Moreover, samples are also sent to independent third-party laboratories for additional testing and analysis. Any sample that fails the company’s stringent quality control protocols results in an automatic rejection of the complete load that it came from. The company does not begin to work with any aggregate supplier until the samples collected from the site pass these tests. By following these procedures, Saudi Readymix has earned the full approval of leading government bodies and organisations such as Aramco, Saudi Electricity Company (SEC), Royal Commission, Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (Sabic) and Ministry of Transportation, to name a few.
The quality control process encompasses not only aggregate testing, but the quarry-related machinery as well. In total, the company operates five crusher plants in its three quarries staffed by a workforce of over 100 (excluding drivers). Saudi Readymix also owns an impressive fleet of quarry machinery and equipment including eight bulldozers, five breakers, 25 dumpers, and 11 loaders, and various other types of auxiliary equipment. In preparation for future acquisitions and expansions, the company ordered several pieces of machinery and equipment earlier this year.
In addition to its regular facilities, each quarry owned by Saudi Readymix contains a fully-equipped onsite workshop to perform the preventive maintenance measures according to a meticulous schedule set by the company’s maintenance engineers in the production department. The schedule is based on numerous factors such as number of work hours and distance travelled, among others. Any major repair job required by the quarry mobile equipment is handled by the company’s main workshop located in Dammam Industrial City.
With a measured yet aggressive growth plan and a passionate commitment to quality, Saudi Readymix looks to continue to lead the way in the Saudi readymixed concrete sector, he concludes.