International Analytics Technology Company, Oniqua, Joins ASCO Group

BRISBANE, Australia--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The ASCO Group, a leading international oil and gas services company, announced today that it has become the majority shareholder in Oniqua MRO Analytics – a global analytics-based technology solutions company.

Headquartered in Brisbane, Australia with offices in North America, South America and South Africa, Oniqua (pronounced o-nee-kwa) provides unique asset performance management (APM) solutions that improve the operational efficiencies and business performance of asset-intensive organisations, such as oil and gas, mining, utilities, process manufacturing and transportation. It employs approximately 50 people worldwide.

ASCO representatives will join the Oniqua board alongside its founders, Andy Hill (CEO) and Chris Wright (President, Asia Pacific). Andy and Chris remain in their current senior managerial positions as well as active co-shareholders in Oniqua. The value of this acquisition has not been disclosed.

Andy Hill commented:

“It’s tremendously exciting that we’ll have the backing, expertise and experience of a global international oil and gas services company to support us in the further development of Oniqua’s product and service lines and we look forward to the new opportunities ASCO’s investment will bring right across our business, particularly in the oil and gas sector in which they are specialists.”

Derek Smith, ASCO Group’s Chief Operating Officer, added:

“We’re really excited about the investment we’ve made in Oniqua. They’re a highly respected company in their sector with a strong management team who we look forward to working in partnership with to develop their business and our own global oil and gas services business. A major part of our logistics, waste management and freight service includes optimising materials, inventory and warehouse management and at present we use a number of bespoke technical solutions to do so. With the addition of the analytics-based solutions that Oniqua brings, we will have even greater scope to standardise the data we collect on our clients’ operations, analyse it to uncover more opportunities for improvement, and then take actionable measures to optimise supply chain and asset performance. In an industry where technology and innovation rules; our investment in Oniqua really stands us apart from other comparable companies in the oil and gas sector.”

The investment in Oniqua comes during a strategic growth phase for the ASCO Group. Other recent investments have included acquiring majority stake holdings in three specialist oilfield services business in Alberta, Canada as well as the international safety training and lifting specialists, NSL. ASCO’s worldwide staff numbers have increased from 1,600 to over 2,000 in this time.