Fluor Enters Bids for Iraq Reconstruction Work

By ANDREW SIMONS

Orange County Business Journal

After weeks of uncertainty, Fluor Corp. is readying to bid on two contracts for rebuilding Iraq’s oil industry.

The Army Corps of Engineers last week issued formal invitations for bids on the work, with responses due by Aug. 14.

The two contracts one for work in northern Iraq and another for work in the south could be worth $500,000 to $500 million each, according to the Army Corps. They’re set to replace an initial contract awarded to Halliburton Co.’s Kellogg Brown & Root International Inc.

“We would expect this to be a stiff competition,” Fluor spokesman Jerry Holloway said.

Whether the politically sensitive contracts would go to bid at all was put in doubt last month when the Army Corps indicated Halliburton’s contract awarded without bidding might last longer than expected because of widespread looting and sabotage of Iraqi oilfields. Officials also expressed doubt about whether a final contract could be in place by August.

The bidding is important for Fluor, which lost out in April on a $680 million master contract to rebuild Iraq’s roads, sewers and other basics to archrival Bechtel Group Inc. of San Francisco.

Last month, Fluor Chief Executive Alan Boeckmann said the company is going after the oil work as part of a strategy of landing more rebuilding work in Iraq in the next decade.

“Our interest in Iraq is long-term,” he told Bloomberg News.

Work for the Army Corps isn’t as profitable as other projects that could play out in Iraq in the next five to 10 years, he said.

Fluor beefed up its lobbying effort in May by naming David Marventano, former staff director of the House’s Energy & Commerce committee, as senior vice president of government affairs in its Washington, D.C., office.

Fluor also has a key contact in Philip Carroll, head of the government’s advisory committee for Iraq’s oil industry. Carroll was Fluor’s chief executive from 1998 to early 2002 and predecessor to Boeckmann.

“It’s important that people know who you are and what your capabilities are,” Holloway said. “That’s one of the things the lobbyist does is make sure people know your capabilities.”