A firm with a reputation for delivery in some of the most pressured environments on the planet, is expanding in South Tyneside.
DME Systems, engineering experts who create tailor-made solutions for the marine and subsea industry, is moving into a new home in Garwood Street, in South Shields.
The business – which has grown from seven specialists just over a year ago, to employ 16 full time employees and 25 in total – has outgrown its home in Jarrow Business Centre following a period of sustained growth.
DME works across the globe, delivering multi-million pound projects in the USA, Mexico, and Japan, to name just a few. Created nearly three years ago, DME offers a solutions-based engineering service designing machinery to overcome specific challenges, often in extreme environments.
Set-up by Darren Coombe and Michael van Zwanenberg, the business had expanded into several offices and workshops at Jarrow Business Centre and desperately needed to find its own premises. Its new HQ provides 7,000 sq ft of warehouse and workshop space and another 4,500 sq ft of offices.
Darren said: “We knew there was a strong market for our solutions and services when we created the business, but the way we have grown over the past few years has been incredible and even taken us a little by surprise.
“In the last few months, we’ve been working in Houston, Texas, multiple jobs in Italy and we’re getting increasing interest in Asia, which is a market we always intended to explore, but ended up coming to us earlier than expected – we’re so busy and long may that continue.
“The new base gives us more workshop space, more office space and keeps us where we want to be in South Tyneside, which has always been our home.”
It has been an incredible three years for DME Systems, repeatedly smashing growth targets and bringing in new employees to capitalise on the positive momentum that the business is experiencing.
The company has established a reputation for skill and ingenuity, designing and developing leading-edge subsea and marine equipment. Its machines can not only help lay and embed cabling and equipment on a variety of seabed, they can also be used to test the seabed ahead of installation, to ensure the correct preparation and equipment is utilised.
Darren added: “Our machines work to maintain and bury cables for the offshore wind industry on seabed across the world. The ground conditions are often different, it might be rock, sand, stony, flat, undulating…and we have developed various products that helps us understand the environment to ensure that we know exactly what to expect when our clients start work.”
DME Systems is Darren, who worked in the Teesside steelworks and for Tyneside based subsea firms; Michael van Zwanenberg, with 20 years’ experience in offshore equipment; Richard Purdy who helped develop some of the world’s largest subsea trenchers; and Stephen Dixon who designs systems and controls essential for machines to operate reliably
Michael, said: “South Tyneside Council has supported us since we set up and helped link us up with the former owners of the Garwood Street premises, after we’d informed the Business Support team we were looking to expand again.
“Starting out at Quadrus, we grew into and then out of Jarrow Business Centre and the council team, especially Gren Irving, couldn’t have helped us more.”
The company has an extensive product range, with topside control and drive systems and a variety of subsea machinery, including pressure-tolerant systems that operate to a depth of up to 6,000m below the surface.
Cllr Margaret Meling, South Tyneside Council portfolio holder for Economic Growth and Transport, said: “DME System’s success and sustained growth is testament to the firm’s skill, experience and determination to succeed.
“The company’s incredibly talented and committed team must be commended for turning a great idea into a fantastic business, creating jobs, boosting skills and cementing a reputation for excellence in an incredibly competitive field. I wish them all the luck in the world.”
