On January 2, 2001, AGRA Infrastructure Inc. officially became AMEC Infrastructure Inc., a subsidiary of the number one international design firm, AMEC plc, as ranked by Engineering News Record (June 2000). Their affiliated, sister company, AGRA Earth & Environmental, became AMEC Earth & Environmental, and together they became one of the largest international design firms, with 50,000 employees in more than 40 countries, and registered professional engineers in all of the western states. AMEC maintains offices in both Reno and Las Vegas.
AMEC Infrastructure, Inc., was originally founded in 1977 as CES – Consulting Engineering Services. In 1999 it became a part of AGRA, Inc., a Canadian firm, and in 2000 was purchased by AMEC plc, headquartered in London. AMEC Infrastructure Inc. specializes in civil engineering, land surveying, landscape architecture and construction management. The company has continued to grow, expanding into a worldwide corporation, without ever losing track of its most basic, important asset —people. “The quality of our staff is key to our success,” said Don Tulloch, P.E., office manager of the Reno branch of AMEC Infrastructure, Inc. “Our greatest asset is our professionals. They’re some of the best engineers, technically, that I have ever worked with. They’re personable and have excellent communications skills. That sets us apart from other companies, as we strive to improve the quality of service as well as communication with our clients.”
Sister company AMEC Earth & Environmental started life in 1959 as SHB (Sergents, Hauskins and Beckworth) — a company that specialized in geo-technical engineering and materials testing — before merging with AGRA and then with AMEC. The mergers have proved to be good news for AMEC’s clients. “We’re a large firm,” said Paul Kaplan, P.E., unit manager of the Reno office of AMEC Earth & Environmental. The combined expertise of an international firm and the local knowledge and personalized attention of a small Reno office is an unbeatable combination, said Kaplan. “We have 50,000 employees worldwide in 40 countries, and that gives us a lot of unique talent and expertise throughout the company. We have the ability to draw on that expertise and talent for any project that may require it.”
AMEC Earth & Environmental is a major consulting firm which offers comprehensive environmental, geo-technical engineering, construction materials testing and project management resources. Like AMEC Infrastructure, Inc., most of its clients are municipalities. Both companies work in Northern Nevada and Northern California for a variety of entities — cities, counties, state governments and special districts, though they are taking on an increasing number of private clients in land development and site design. “A lot of our work is for the mining industry, which in Nevada is seeing some tough times,” said Kaplan. “However, we’re staying rather busy in that market and locally doing geo-tech work and environmental and materials testing work.”
Company officials believe the future looks as good as what has come before. “I think AGRA was good for us,” said Tulloch. “And AMEC is better. We have the benefits of the other offices and more diversified expertise to draw from, and it’s already paying off for us. AMEC has also been great for keeping us abreast of changes in the field — with our networking system and computer systems, we are able to produce projects much faster and to minimize cost.”
When asked where the success of AMEC lies, Kaplan points to its people. “It’s the employees. Success comes from the fact that we are a fairly large company with a large pool of talent, which gives us the ability to draw on those people when we need to for specific projects. What we sell basically is people, and we have people with the specialized skills to bring to bear on any particular project. We don’t sell a product, necessarily — we sell people, and we sell talent.”
