China's Sinoma Tightens Its Grip on Middle East Cement, New EPC Contracts in Iraq and Saudi Arabia Confirm a Dominant Regional Strategy

Sinoma International Engineering, the world's largest provider of cement engineering services and a subsidiary of China National Building Material Group (CNBM), has secured new engineering, procurement and construction contracts in both Iraq and Saudi Arabia, further cementing its position as the go-to EPC contractor for cement infrastructure across the Middle East. The contracts, reported in early 2026, add to an already formidable portfolio of awarded work in the region and reinforce a pattern that the global construction industry cannot afford to ignore: Chinese contractors are systematically winning the industrial manufacturing pipeline across the Gulf and wider Arab world.

Project Overview

The latest wave of Sinoma contract activity spans two of the region's most strategically important markets, adding production capacity at a time when both countries face significant domestic demand pressures.

Iraq Contract:

• Client: Al-Diyar Company for Cement Industry and Industrial Investment

• Location: Samawa area, Muthanna Governorate, southern Iraq

• Scope: Full clinker production line from limestone crushing to cement packaging, including a 50MW supporting power station

• Production capacity: 6,000 tonnes per day (TPD)

• Contract value: USD 220 million

• Contractor: Sinoma International Engineering (Beijing subsidiary)

Saudi Arabia Contract (Qassim Cement):

• Client: Qassim Cement Company (QCC)

• Location: Buraydah, Qassim Province, Saudi Arabia

• Scope: Fourth production line at existing plant site, full EPC turnkey delivery

• Production capacity: 10,000 tonnes per day (TPD)

• Contract value: USD 298 million (SAR 1.12 billion)

• Contract duration: 24 months from construction start

• Contractor: Sinoma International Engineering

Delivery Partners and Key Stakeholders

Iraq:

• Sinoma International Engineering (Beijing subsidiary): EPC contractor responsible for full design, procurement, construction, installation, testing, commissioning and operator training

• Al-Diyar Company for Cement Industry and Industrial Investment: Iraqi client and plant owner, based in Muthanna Governorate

• CNBM (China National Building Material Group): Parent company of Sinoma International; one of the world's largest building materials groups by revenue

Saudi Arabia:

• Sinoma International Engineering: EPC contractor, with established Saudi subsidiary and proven local delivery track record

• Qassim Cement Company (QCC): Tadawul-listed Saudi cement producer, client and project employer

• Eng. Omar Al-Omar, CEO of Qassim Cement: Stated the project will "replace certain outdated, low-efficiency production lines by incorporating the latest technological advancements"

• Saudi Vision 2030: The broader policy framework driving industrial capacity upgrades and energy efficiency targets that underpin Qassim Cement's investment rationale

Sinoma Overseas Development, a separate CNBM subsidiary operating in the region, also signed an EPC contract with Yamama Cement in early 2026 for a cement silos project in Saudi Arabia, building on a long-term partnership that has already delivered a 10,000 TPD clinker line since upgraded to 12,500 TPD, demonstrating the depth and duration of Chinese contractor relationships with Saudi industrial clients.

Construction and Technical Details

Both projects follow Sinoma's standard turnkey EPC model, which covers the complete cement manufacturing value chain from raw material handling through to finished product dispatch. This integrated approach is central to Sinoma's competitive advantage: clients procure a single contractor responsible for the entire technical and commercial scope, significantly reducing interface risk.

Key technical features across both contracts:

• Full clinker production line design and engineering by Sinoma's in-house teams

• Limestone crushing, raw mill, kiln, cooler and finish mill systems

• Material handling, storage and dispatch infrastructure

• Process control and automation systems

• Operator and maintenance training programmes as part of the EPC package

• 50MW dedicated power station included in the Iraq contract scope, reflecting the infrastructure deficit in Muthanna Governorate

• Iraq project located in Samawa, a historically underserved industrial region where cement production capacity supports both reconstruction and long-term housing demand

• Saudi project designed to replace low-efficiency legacy lines with modern, high-output technology aligned with Vision 2030 energy efficiency objectives

Production at both sites is expected to commence within 24 months of contract start, consistent with Sinoma's standard programme parameters for this scale of facility.

Timeline

• 2022: Sinoma signs 10,000 TPD clinker line contract with Yamama Cement, Saudi Arabia — a relationship that later underpins 2026 silo EPC award

• May/June 2023: Sinoma wins USD 330 million contract with Southern Province Cement for new Jizan cement plant, Saudi Arabia

• August 2023: Iraq contract with Al-Diyar Company, Muthanna Governorate, announced at USD 220 million

• January 2024: Sinoma wins USD 270 million Eastern Province Cement contract, Saudi Arabia

• August 2025: Qassim Cement awards USD 298 million fourth production line contract to Sinoma

• January 2026: Sinoma Overseas signs new EPC silo contract with Yamama Cement — first Sinoma EPC agreement of 2026

• 2027/2028: Projected production start at both Iraq and Qassim Cement sites, subject to letter of credit issuance and site handover

Strategic Importance

Sinoma's accumulation of Middle East cement contracts is not a series of isolated commercial wins. It is a deliberate, long-term market penetration strategy that leverages CNBM's financial scale, Sinoma's proprietary process technology and China's willingness to offer competitive financing arrangements to cement producers in high-growth markets.

Saudi Arabia's cement sector is in the middle of a significant technological and capacity transition. Vision 2030 has created a construction supercycle — NEOM, ROSHN, Diriyah, Qiddiya and a national housing programme are all driving unprecedented demand for building materials. Saudi cement producers are responding by replacing ageing plant with high-efficiency modern lines, and Sinoma has positioned itself as the default delivery partner for those upgrades. With contracts now held at Yamama, Qassim, Eastern Province, Southern Province and multiple other producers, Sinoma's market share in Saudi cement EPC is extraordinary by any measure.

Iraq represents a different but equally compelling strategic rationale. Years of conflict and underinvestment have left the country with a chronic cement supply deficit relative to its reconstruction needs. International contractors have been cautious about Iraq, given security, payment and regulatory risk. Sinoma's appetite for the Muthanna project, including the provision of a supporting power station within scope, signals a willingness to accept complexity that many Western EPC contractors would decline. That risk appetite is building long-term commercial relationships in a market that will require decades of infrastructure investment.

Construction Opportunities

Sinoma's regional expansion creates both direct and indirect opportunities for construction professionals and materials businesses.

• Process equipment and specialist components for cement plant installations, particularly kiln, mill and cooler systems where Western manufacturers can compete on technology

• Refractory lining, wear-resistant materials and specialist consumables are required throughout the plant lifecycle

• Local civil and structural works subcontracting opportunities, as Sinoma typically procures enabling works and civils packages from regional contractors

• Commissioning, testing and operator training partnerships for both Iraq and Saudi sites

• Power infrastructure subcontracts, given the 50MW station included in the Iraq scope

• Ongoing operations and maintenance contracts post-commissioning, as Saudi clients increasingly demand long-term service agreements alongside EPC delivery

• Supply chain opportunities within the broader CNBM and Sinoma vendor ecosystem, which is actively seeking compliant regional partners to support localisation requirements in Saudi Arabia

For professionals working across Saudi Arabia and Iraq, understanding Sinoma's procurement model and vendor qualification process is increasingly a prerequisite for accessing cement sector work in these markets.

Writer's Opinion

Sinoma's dominance in Middle East cement EPC is one of the most consequential and least discussed stories in regional construction. The numbers are stark. In Saudi Arabia alone, Sinoma has won contracts across Yamama, Qassim, Eastern Province, Southern Province and others, representing well over USD 1 billion in awarded work across a handful of years. No Western EPC contractor comes close to that market penetration in a single sector.

The uncomfortable question this raises is not about Sinoma's quality, which by most accounts is technically competent and commercially aggressive. The question is about strategic dependency. Saudi Arabia's cement production infrastructure is being designed, engineered and built almost entirely by a Chinese state-backed contractor. When those facilities need expansion, retrofitting or emergency support in 20 years' time, the institutional knowledge, the process documentation and the vendor relationships will all sit in Beijing. That is a dependency that Saudi industrial policy has so far chosen to accept in exchange for competitive pricing and delivery speed.

The Iraq story is different again. In a country still rebuilding basic infrastructure, Sinoma is delivering a 6,000 TPD cement plant and a 50MW power station in a single EPC package in one of the country's most underserved governorates. That is genuinely useful. The criticism that Chinese contractors extract value without creating local capability has some validity, but it has to be weighed against the reality that without Sinoma's appetite for the Muthanna contract, that plant almost certainly does not get built on any comparable timeline.

The construction industry should engage with this picture honestly. Chinese contractors are not winning these contracts because Gulf and Iraqi clients lack alternatives. They are winning because their offering, on price, speed, integration and risk appetite, is frequently superior. Until Western EPC contractors can match that combination, the analysis must focus on how to work alongside Sinoma's ecosystem rather than pretending competition is straightforward.