Rental may be the word on a lot of plant manager and machine buyers’ lips at the moment but that doesn’t mean that people aren’t interested in new or used equipment.
In fact, there hasn’t been a better time to buy machinery in the market for some time.
Manufacturers still need to push new models through the distributors and late models are flooding the auction houses. Meanwhile buyers remain thin on the ground with money still hard to come by and those selling new and used equipment are having to work harder to broaden their geographical and traditional market presence.
So if you have the money, now is the time to start putting that shopping list together and on the following pages you can find out more about some of the companies that will help you find that machine you’ve been looking for.
Ritchie Bros
Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers is the world’s largest industrial auctioneer, selling more equipment to on-site and on-line bidders than any other company in the world.
In June 2009 it generated US $35.93 million (AED132 million) in sales in Dubai, with an average 15% to 20% increase in turnover year-on-year.
Ritchie sells through unreserved public auctions a broad range of used and unused equipment for the construction, transportation, agricultural, materials-handling, mining, forestry, petroleum and marine industries.
The company maintains a website at rbauction.com and sponsors an equipment wiki at RitchieWiki.com.
It was established in 1958 in Canada, holding its first unreserved auction in 1958 and its first unreserved industrial auction in 1963.
Headquartered in Vancouver, Ritchie has more than 110 locations worldwide, including 40 auction sites in North America, Europe, the Middle East and Australia. It has more than 1100 full-time employees around the world.
WWA
World Wide Auctions (WWA) sells everything from bulldozers and cranes to hydraulic excavators and concrete associated machinery to buyers, well, all over the world.
Its unreserved auctions have been held in Dubai, Amsterdam, Qatar, Australia, the Philippines and the USA. It also claims to sell more second hand construction equipment to more people than any other organisation in the GGC countries of the Arabian Gulf.
The Company plans to expand its auction and private equipment sales business into other GCC countries, and subsequently leverage the valuable resources collected from this business into other related businesses. Part of this expansion plan includes:
World Wide Auctioneers holds fully unreserved auctions, with no minimum bids, seller bids, or reserved items, assuring buyers and sellers that equipment is traded at fair market value.
Auctions have been held in Dubai, Amsterdam, Qatar, Guangzhou, Jakarta, Perth, Philippines, Lebanon, India and the USA. WWA strives to provide the finest service in the Industrial Auction business.
WWA has sold at auction over 64,700 items construction equipment at its 79 auctions in Dubai from March 2001 through December 2010, for a total amount of over $947 Million in auction value.
Iron Planet
Iron Planet, the online auction house, announced its official arrival into the Middle East market at the start of 2011. While it may now have a physical presence in the region via its newly opened Dubai offices, the truth is the company has been a force to reckon with since beginning trading at the end of the last decade.
Heavy machinery in the Gulf is a fast-moving industry, with equipment changing hands at speed as construction activity shifts around the region. Few companies have facilitated that fluid market as much as Iron Planet, nor helped transform the bidding bonanza into the digital age.
The pioneering company (a survivor of the dotcom era) describes itself as the ‘eBay of construction equipment’ freeing sellers from the costs of getting items to auctions and buyers from attending the physical auction.
The company’s detailed and extensive website charts a wide range of machinery and equipment – from the Middle East to Europe and Canada – boosting, it says, profits through low transaction costs and the better price realisations from a global scrum of bidders.
Euro Auctions
Euro Auctions is another new kid on the block. Euro Auctions HQ is located in Dromore, Co. Tyrone, Northern Ireland but it now has an international reach.
The UK’s largest auctioneer of heavy plant and construction equipment is currently undergoing an expansion across Europe and looking to reach out to the Middle East market.
Late last year it opened a new site location in Valencia, one of Spain’s main ports, which is says allows it have a “distribution platform for the currently booming markets of northern Africa and the Middle East”.
For over 12 years, Euro Auctions has been conducting unreserved auctions of Industrial Plant and Construction Equipment throughout Europe.
Today, Euro Auctions conducts over 15 major auctions every year and is the market leader in the UK and Ireland and one of the leading Industrial Auctioneers in Europe.
The company also specialises in off-site auctions for Cessation of Trading or Retirement Sales.
Arabian Auto Agency
Arabian Auto Agency is one of Saudi Arabia’s leading distributors of engineering equipment.
With a kingdom-wide sales, service, parts and support network, AAA operates a network of more than 15 locations and claims to be the kingdom’s number one distributor, a claim backed up by some leading global brands in construction, transportation, agricultural and materials handling equipment have made us partner of choice.
AAA has built its reputation built over more than 40 years and has its own dedicated, state-of the-art bus plant at Zeemat in Riyadh.
The 100,000m2 site represented a significant capital investment, placing AAA as one of the few manufacturers of commercial vehicles in not only Saudi Arabia but the wider GCC.
Al Jomaih Company
Al jomaih a pioneering trading company in KSA, was established in 1936 by the brothers Abdulaziz and Mohammad Abdullah Aljomaih, at Shaqra town, 200 km. from Riyadh.
Today its head office is in Riyadh, and it has kept pace with the commercial and industrial boom experienced by KSA.
The company has occupies a prominent position in automobile, heavy equipment, agriculture machine, foodstuffs, and represents a number of international companies.
It also owns a carbon dioxide plant and lubricants blending plant. Additionally, Al jomaih has partnerships in several industrial and investment companies and continues to grow and play a vital role in the economic development of the kingdom.
Zahid Tractor & Heavy Machinery Co. Ltd.
The Zahid family has been distributing Caterpillar machinery and equipment since 1950, serving virtually all of the KSA’s public and private sectors.
Zahid Tractor and Heavy Machinery was incorporated in 1967, and over the years it added international brands such as Barber Green and Bitelli asphalt pavers; Challenger agricultural tractors; Daewoo buses, Demag cranes, Ingersoll Rand compressors; JLG and Jungheinrich material handling equipment; Lorain cranes; Peerless pumps; Rammer industrial hammers; Renault trucks; Svetruck specialised lifts; Terex cranes; and Volvo trucks and buses.
Zahid Tractor has been subsequently restructured into three efficiently run divisions providing comprehensive customer-centric specialised solutions to a number of industries, including construction and mining.
Kitmondo
Kitmondo is an international marketplace for buyers and sellers of used equipment that seems to be under the radar of most people. However the website appears to be gaining popularity with some traders and sellers.
You won’t find anything new on the website but there’s plenty of local machinery going relatively cheaply.
It’s not just small ticket items there either, at the time of going to press you could pick up a 75m POTAIN MDT 368 crane from the site. Not as sophisticated as Iron Planet or as conclusive as Ritchie, but you never know what you mind find on there.
ASE
Al Shirawi Enterprises was appointed sole distributor for Scania trucks and buses in 1981 for Dubai. The company soon established itself as a market leader in the heavy truck sector.
The company was the first Scania distributor in the Gulf to implement the Scania plus programme, the first distributor in the Middle East to aggressively promote Scania marine and industrial engines, the first distributor to have chassis straightening equipment, and the first distributor in the Middle East to win the ‘After Sales Importer of the Year’ award, in 1995.
In 2000, the company became the only truck dealer to be approved by Dubai Police for Truck and Heavy Equipment Inspection Passing. It was ranked second in Scania’s global leadership competition.
In 2010 it moved into a new state of the art 350,000 sq ft facility in Dubai Investments park (DIP). Thisfacility operates as a base for its body shop and rentals.
Al Nawi BME (Building Materials & Equipment Trading)
Al Nawi BME has been a reliable provider of high-quality equipment, machinery and materials for the construction sector for some time.
Its equipment division is divided into access solutions and plant ans tools. Both divisions have their own dedicated personnel who are specialised in their own respective fields.
“We believe in experience and know-how and that is something that we nurture within the divisions,” says the company. “Ultimately, it is the combination of our products and our people that will allow us to keep our customers satisfied.”
House of Equipment
House of Equipment was incorporated in the year 2004 as a “Construction Equipment” solution provider wing of Arabtec.
HoE is an innovative and dynamic rapidly growing company specialised in managing, trading, servicing and rental of construction equipment.
Holding onto some of the world’s leading manufacturers of construction equipment, HoE has established an operational base in Dubai with branches in Abu Dhabi and sells overseas and services the entire Middle East.
