Member Article

Record breaking 85% export success for Sunderland’s TRM Group

Sunderland-based manufacturer Thermal Resources Management (TRM) Group has completed three major international projects, creating new jobs and boosting the group’s exporting total to a record 85% in 2014.

Large contracts on the high-profile New Delhi metro system, the huge Kuwait University campus and Kuwait International Airport have been completed by the group, which has added 10 staff in the last 12 months, bringing the total workforce at its facility at the Wear Industrial Estate, Washington, to 90.

TRM is aiming to create more jobs over the next year as part of further expansion plans.

The group makes temperature measurement devices manufacturing, industrial heating systems and fireproof wiring cable.

Its thermocouple and trace heating equipment is unique in the UK, and highly sought after by the petrochemical, oil and gas, aviation, electronics and automotive sectors.

At the peak of the New Delhi Metro system project, TRM supplied 40,000 metres of wiring per month. The public transport system now covers 120 miles and carries up to two million passengers a day.

The group has also completed a £1 million project at the New University City campus for Kuwait University, supplying fireproof wiring cable for bombproof shelters that can withstand the fiercest fires. Each bomb shelter can hold hundreds of people.

The massive campus, which will be the world’s largest when completed, occupies a 540 hectare (1285 acre) site. By next year, more than 30,000 full time students will be accommodated at its 16 colleges and related support facilities.

Kuwait is an important and growing market for the TRM group, which also includes sister company MICC (Mineral Insulated Cables Company).

The group is returning to the country for the Big Five Kuwait Show, the nation’s largest construction event, where it will be exhibiting with a local company it has partnered with to win work from the huge infrastructure investment currently taking place in Kuwait.

MICC has also finished a key job supplying its technically-advanced fire survival cable – which can withstand fire for two hours,at the new Kuwait International Airport administration building, designed by Foster and Partners.

Sunderland City Council’s business investment team has worked with the group since it moved to Washington.

The City Council has supported the growth of group’s current plant, but its exporting successes mean it is close to outgrowing the space and it is keen to work with the council again in the future to find larger premises.

TRM works with partners in India, the Middle East, Saudi Arabia and the US, and it is looking to appoint partner companies in Oman, Qatar, Dubai and Brazil.

The group’s turnover is now around £8m, and it invested more than £75k in upgrading its communications systems, including an enterprise relationship programme to help its global activities progress smoothly.

TRM has been equally successful in exporting its industrial trace heating solutions, partnering with leading constructors of concentrated solar power plants, for completed projects in North America, Africa and Russia.

It has also attracted world-leading customers such as Reliance Industries, and has partnered with Starflex in India to provide design and insulation solutions to Reliance, one of the world’s biggest companies.

The group’s advanced temperature sensors are also supplied to UK and global power station operators, to support them with innovative solutions to their research and development needs.

Managing director of TRM, Doug Dooley, said: “Our products are used in the most demanding of places worldwide such as the bottom of oil wells, nuclear plants and in the skies, all of which demand the highest standards of safety for vital temperature measurement devices.

“We are delighted at the company’s success in winning major projects worldwide. These each bring work to our plant in Sunderland, and increase the numbers and quality of jobs we can offer local people.”

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