Qatar Shell recently hosted a group of graduate students from DePaul University in the US who visited Qatar to learn about the nation’s entrepreneurship and business initiatives.
The delegation of 12 masters of business administration students and a mentor focused on Qatar Shell’s ‘LC/SME Business Opportunities’ programme, a collaboration with Qatar Development Bank.
The programme awards locally-owned businesses with contracts in the Qatar Shell supply chain.
Four Qatari Local Content (LC)/ Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) signed contracts with Qatar Shell with a fifth expected to sign later next month.
“At Shell, we believe it makes business sense to support local SMEs. Not only does it help grow the local economy, but it helps us with supply chain challenges that we experience due to the volume of our requirements,” said Nick van Keulen, general manager for Contracting and Procurement in Qatar. “If we need a replacement part, we can get it in two days, not two weeks,” he added.
Shell Commercial Excellence and LC and SME enterprises manager Amro Ahmed outlined the Qatar Shell tendering and bidding process, and cited the company’s collaboration with contracted SMEs.
The move, he said, aims to make such businesses more efficient and raise their standards to enable them to compete internationally.
Ahmed also advised aspiring entrepreneurs about how to avoid failure, based on his experiences working with local SMEs.
“All the businesses that did not work out had in common was that they gave up when things got tough,” he added.
Qatar Shell welcomed business students from the US recently.
