It is hard to believe it’s 10 years since we started Apollo, and on the other hand, it’s hard to believe it’s not more. What a journey! Filled with excitement, challenge, opportunities, great clients, and a fantastic bunch of people that have got us to where we find ourselves today.
There has been many ups and downs, but we have achieved year on year growth (if we just forget 2015). A fact that I am incredibly proud of. Today I can announce that we are about to start work with our 325th client and record over £50 million pounds in cumulative revenue from a standing start 10 years ago.
We launched on the 22-September-2010, and within months were active on BP’s Andrew project providing structural design support. Our second project was in renewables on the Sheringham Shoal offshore wind farm. This cemented our path of working across the energy industry and that diversity has been the cornerstone of Apollo. Something we have continued to build on as the business has grown year on year. We have expanded our work in Renewables, such as the harnessing of Ocean Energy in areas like wave and tidal. Additionally we have supported several clients in bringing new technologies to market from, in some cases the garden shed, to full scale and commercialisation.
Within Oil and Gas, we now offer full discipline front end and through life consultancy services. Structures and process solutions were our core strengths in the early days, but this quickly evolved across all engineering disciplines. To the point that we recently mobilised a full 20 engineer discipline team to look at a life extension strategy for a North Sea FPSO. A project which the team is now moving into FEED.
While all businesses face challenges, Apollo has had its fair share and faced many both unique and difficult industry wide scenarios including downturns, oil price challenges, and most recently of course COVID-19. Amid this our founder, Jonathan D’Arcy, survived a near fatal accident. On a personal note, it is great to watch him continuing his recovery process and Jon retains an active and keen interest in the company. Thanks to the culture and organisation he helped found, Apollo continued on its growth trajectory.
In March 2019 Apollo achieved another major milestone with the investment from Global Energy Group, acquiring 51% in our business. This has given us a bigger and better launch pad for the future and created synergies that increase the value we can offer our clients throughout the project life cycle.
Currently Apollo is project managing a significant marine scope in the order of 100,000 man hours with a number of Global Energy Group companies to the ultimate satisfaction of the client and operator. 18 months into this partnership, and still in one of the most challenging times for the Energy Industry, the combined leverage with Global Energy Group has facilitated continued growth and opportunity. We continue to operate “independently”, with some legacy parts of Apollo integrated into Global’s Brownfield EPC company – Global E&C.
In turn this allows Apollo to continue to focus on front end and through life consultancy in oil and gas and renewables marketplaces. Additionally, through this relationship, we are now active in nuclear, hydro and water markets. All natural fits for our skills and services. We have been and will continue to help drive the energy transition. So, what does the next 10 years hold for us? Well, I think it now goes without saying that we fully expect to see further growth as a key requisite in our future plans. Our vision and our values will hold us in great stead for the future.
Are we infatuated with growth? You could say we are but for the right reasons – a core driver for establishing Apollo was to create an enjoyable place to work, to attract the best talent in the industry, and overarching all of this, to create opportunities for our people. We’ve proven this by creating opportunities and facilitating progression internally and the hard part is to continue to be able to do this. That can only come with growth. Surround yourself with great people and good things will happen. This has certainly been my experience and we have pulled together some of our biggest milestones below.
Over the next 10 years, we will continue to support our clients as we progress our journey through the Energy Transition without losing sight of where we came from, we recently completed our 100th renewables project – a fantastic achievement. The Oil and Gas market will continue to be a key part of our business as we help clients find more efficient ways to do things, commercially and environmentally. There is always more work to be done but I would like to say a huge thanks to everyone who has made the last 10 years possible and given us the opportunity to plan our next mission, further growth over the next 10 years.
Ryan Menzies
Managing Director