Big export order for N.Z. firm

Press, 28 July 1977, Page 24

Big export order for N.Z. firm

PA ” Auckland Electrical switchgear worth S2M will be provided for a Malaysian power station by an Auckland firm, A. and G. Price Electrical. Won ahead of 13 tenders from throughout the world, the contract is believed to be one of the biggest engineering export orders awarded to a New Zealand company. The New Zealand-de-signed switchgear is for the Prai power station at Penang, which will be the biggest in Malaysia. . Engineers from A. and G. Price, which is part of the Cable Price Downer group, will supervise the installation of the equipment, expected to be commissioned on site in October next year. The general manager of the comapny (Mr G. Angus) returned to Auckland on Sunday after his fourth tirp to Malaysia for negotiations with the National Electricity Board of Malaysia. “The New Zealand design is a major thing,” said Mr Angus. “We are exporting our own technology.”

The bid was fourth from the bottom — above the lowest tender.

Mr Angus said the reputation of his firm's products, built up over many years, had helped win the order. “We’ve done a lot of homework on the market,” he said. “The company ■has spent many thousands of dollars over several

years in market development, which has now paid off.”

He said his firm was confident of winning more orders for the Asian region now that a breakthrough into the market had been achieved. “We are not an industry seeking protection. We want only to be able to compete on the world market,” he said.

Mr Angus commended the New Zealand Trade Commissioner in Kuala Lumpur (Mr D. Pheasant) for the assistance he gave during negotiations for the contract.

The Penang contract is the latest in a series of export orders won by A. and G. Price.

Last year the firm received an export award from the Department of Trade and Industry. In 1968 it exported switchgear to. an aluminium refinery in Brazil for the American firm Aluminium Company of America (Alcoa), and have since had 36 repeat orders from Alcoa for equipment for Brazil and Western Australia.

Recently A. and G. Price received a $300,000 order from Alcoa in Western Australia. The company has won contracts worth $500,000 to public utility commissions in Australia and has tenders pending for $2.5M Worth of equipment. Mr Angus said that New Zealand manufacturers faced heavy preferential tariffs in Australia

that made competitive pricing very difficult. The company has supplied equipment to power stations at Huntly, New Plymouth, Marsden, Stratford, and Otahuhu, but it was the export sales that give the greatest boost, said Mr Angus. “The New Zealand market cannot absorb all the production, so it is a case of having to get out and export — it is absolutely essential,”