Local WA Manufacturer Magellan Power Weighs in on the Damage Caused to Local Businesses by Collapse of Electrical Contractor ECM.
Magellan Power is a family-owned Western Australian designer and manufacturer of back-up power systems and energy storage, in operation for 28 years.
Magellan, which was recently named Best Family Business by the WA Business News Rising Stars Awards, has now been left hugely out of pocket after contractor ECM collected their equipment worth half a million dollars and refused to pay for it.
Now the manufacturer is under immense pressure to continue day to day operations without the large payment, which took months of resources and engineering time to complete.
The ECM contract which Magellan Power was supplying was for HMAS Stirling, a Defence project based on Garden Island, located off the coast of Perth, Western Australia.
Managing Director of Magellan Power Masoud Abshar says he is disgusted at the lack of regard for local suppliers by the contractor.
“I blame it on greed and mismanagement by the ECM executives, who have no consideration for their position over Western Australian suppliers. To me, I think their primary focus was to wine and dine and find ‘mates’ in the right places, to win more contracts only to extend their astronomical salaries for another couple of years.”
“They drilled us down for every cent, reducing our margins to very little, with unrealistic time pressure. Then they very nicely took the completed equipment, and repeatedly lied to us for months when we sought payment. The last we heard from them was that payment would be in our account by Monday, and after that the phones were cut off, and no one could tell us anything.”
Magellan Power has been designing and manufacturing power equipment since 1991, and has supplied many large Australian projects since inception, including contracts for Rio Tinto, BHP, FMG, Santos, Optus Stadium, Crown Towers and many others.
The Australian manufacturer has employed hundreds of local graduates over the years, developing the careers of many up and coming electronic and electrical professionals.
Magellan Power also invests heavily in Research and Development projects, collaborating with several of the universities in Western Australia on new technologies, and has saved millions of dollars’ worth of imports coming into the country.
“There are a lot of local businesses, family owned and run enterprises, hurting now this has happened, and the sad thing is that this never changes. Our shallow pool of local expertise and knowledge is never allowed to grow, and that is a horrible shame and lasting legacy for the future of manufacturing and know-how in WA.” said Mr. Abshar.
Magellan Power has a staff of 70 electrical engineers and associated professions and has 8 family members who work within the business.
