Arctic Directory: Engineered Fire & Safety: Providing full detection and protection for its clients in the oil industry

Environmentally friendly EFS upgrading current systems to more efficient detection, suppression systems

Q. What do you most want people to know about your company?

A. We are part of United Technologies Corporation and are in the Global Suppression Group of Companies under the UTC Fire & Security business unit. What is unique about our structure, and beneficial to our clients is the vertical integration within UTCFS. Our sister companies include Chemetron Fire Systems, Kidde-Fenwal, Detector Electronics, Marioff, Onity, Verex and many other Fire Systems Manufacturers and Service Providers. Our legal entity is Kidde-Fenwal, d.b.a. Engineered Fire & Safety.

Q. Where is your company located?

A. We are located at 3138 Commercial Drive in Anchorage.

Q. What year was the company founded? Who founded it, and what was its original name?

A. In 1986, by Larry Jesclard, Engineered Fire Systems.

Q. Who heads up your company and who is on its senior management team?

A. Don Maupin is our general manager; Matt Atkins, sales and service manager. Our management team consists of Materials Manager Antrone Kingston; Office Manager Don Maupin; and Sales and Service Manager, Matt Atkins.

Q. Describe any partnership arrangements and when they became effective.

A. With our acquisition by UTC in 2005 we became the exclusive representative for Detector Electronics in Alaska. This inter-company relationship with Detector Electronics has led to the expansion of our panel fabrication shop, which is on the ground floor of our building, and we are an UL508a shop, falling under the Kidde-Fenwal ISO 9001 certification.

Q. What is the company’s primary business sector?

A. Our niche is fire and gas protection systems for oil and gas companies, telecom, and power generation. We have field staff that conduct inspections, service, repairs and system commissioning and start-up services. Our design and engineering staff conduct site surveys, hazard analysis, and code interpretations, and we offer complete design build services to our clients. We feel we’re leading the industry in “GREEN” fire suppression and have numerous projects on the books for 2009 that are WaterMist systems and Novec 1230 agent-based. All UTC produced.

Q. Are there important projects the company is currently a part of or has done recently?

A. We have received awards from BP Alaska over the last 18 months for our support of their Pipeline Renewal Projects, including OTL-21 & 28 and the WRD projects. We are currently working with UPS to provide advanced fire detection and suppression for their new multimillion-dollar flight simulator that will be used to train their pilots for years to come. This project is here in Anchorage and incorporates Advanced High Sensitivity Smoke Detection Systems and Novec 1230 gaseous agent for suppression.

Q. How many employees does your company have?

A. We currently have 18 employees.

 Q. What is your company’s main strength or its edge over the competition?

A. Our ability to leverage the resources of UTCFS. Our close cooperation and sharing of resources amongst our group allow us to draw on the strengths of a global company and leverage that into our daily work here in Anchorage.

Q. What new markets, clients or projects did your company attract in the last year?

A. We have projects going on that reach from California to the North Slope. A sampling of our new projects for 2009 include design, supply and installation of the UPS Flight Simulator Fire Protection System; suppression system design for Turbomachinery being installed by the city of Redding, California at their Power Generating Unit No. 6.; fabrication and supply of the Fire System Control Panels for BP Alaska’s Milne Point Unit Chemical Injection Skids; and the Teck POGO Gold Mine outside Delta Junction, fire alarm system for their new construction camp.

Q. Has the company invested in any new technology in the last two years?

A. We have implemented the UTC initiative of A.C.E (Achieving Competitive Excellence) via integration of the JDE Oracle accounting and inventory control software. This allows us complete on-line Web-based access to our parent companies accounting, production and inventory management systems.

Q. What is the most challenging job the company has undertaken? 

A. Working with BP Alaska to supply the oil transit lines renewal projects with on-time and on-budget fire protection systems. These projects were large in scope to begin with and were ever evolving with modifications to both deliverables and end user expectations. There were tight deadlines and a tremendous amount of coordination between BP on the slope, BP in town and EFS.

 Q. What do you see as your company’s biggest challenge in the next five years?

A. Managing our growth.

A. We see real opportunities to upgrade existing fire system installations and infrastructure, i.e. systems that have been installed for decades, to more efficient and environmentally friendly detection and suppression systems. Water Mist technology is truly amazing and is quickly gaining traction in the U.S. Market due to zero environmental impact and lower cost of ownership for end users. We are actively marketing these low-impact solutions for current client needs.

Q. What is the average length of time employees work for the company?

A. Most of our employees have been with us for 6 or more years.

Q. What is your company’s safety record?

A. We have gone nearly 4 years with an incident-free workplace. We actively engage our employees in the Job Safety Analysis steps and perform Safety and Environmental Task Assessments at the start of every job every day.

Q. Has your company received any awards or recognition?

A. For 2008 we received awards from BP Alaska for our contributions to their OTL projects, along with Outstanding Sales Awards from Detector Electronics and Siemens.

Q. Does your company have a Web site?

A. www.efs-fire.com and www.utc.com