Dorma, a world market leader in door controls, movable walls, and glass fittings and accessories, has opened a production facility at its Middle East headquarters in the Jebel Ali Free Zone (Jafza) to meet the growing demands of the region’s booming construction sector.

“The phenomenal growth of the Middle East market means that those serving the construction sector need to gear up with a much stronger presence in the region,” said Ben Shaw, regional director, Dorma Gulf. “This fiscal year Dorma generated a 44.3 per cent increase in sales from the Gulf region. In response to this growth, we will now have an assembly and production facility based in Jebel Ali, over a 6,500 sq m area. Service personnel are also being hired in order to ensure smooth installation and maintenance of the systems in the region.”
Over 2006-2007, Germany-based Dorma has streamlined its production and distribution processes, and expanded its production capacities in the door automation segment considerably through the construction of a new production centre in Bulgaria and the facility just opened in Dubai. Dorma’s production centre at Jafza will focus on the manufacturer’s four product segments: door hardware, automatic and revolving doors, glass fittings and systems, security systems and movable walls. The Gulf region is Dorma’s strongest growth market for the latter product division. The Dubai World Trade Centre uses 60 Dorma Moveo elements, and was among the first references for this product range.
“At the highest level within the Dorma Group, the Gulf region is recognised as the fastest growing market. Suppliers and material providers to the construction industry face growing competition to serve this market, and it’s going to become very challenging for organisations that don’t invest in developing their regional presence,” Shaw said.
Dorma Gulf’s projects include the provision of over 300 automatic sliding door operators designed to provide passengers using Dubai International Airport with maximum ease of access. The Millenium Grandstand at the Dubai Racing Club is a Dorma Gulf project.
As many as 10 Dorma revolving doors have been installed to guide people into the Twin Towers of Doha.
 Dorma is also a successful player in the security, time management and access control segment and the number one in Germany for emergency exit control and escape route security systems. Dorma maintains major production plants in Europe, Singapore, Malaysia, China and North and South America. With an international workforce of around 6,500 employees, the group realised sales of 838 million euros in fiscal 2006/7 (30 June).