Taurus Industrial Group: Built to Serve

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Created to meet the needs of a rapidly changing business environment, Taurus Industrial Group is redefining how professional industrial services are delivered

Taurus Industrial Group was made for this moment. Literally. Introduced in 2019 as a portfolio company of the energy investment firm SCF Partners, Taurus has built a carefully assembled framework of renowned professional services contractors into a dynamic technical energy services ecosystem poised to evolve and grow with the changing needs of the industry.

Based in Houston, Taurus is a game-changing integrated and industry diversified technical services company offering end-to-end services across multiple service lines. Leveraging a growing footprint with operations in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, Taurus’s professional services offerings cover electrical and instrumentation, engineering and automation, power systems testing and commissioning, civil and mechanical crafts, pipe and structural steel fabrication, rotating and reciprocating equipment maintenance and repairs, full service soft crafts, insulation and scaffold, refractory design and installation, specialty tooling and machining, technical bolting, heat treating, hot-tapping and line stopping and NDT.

The industry-diversified firm operates across multiple industries and sectors, providing front-end engineering, routine maintenance, capital projects, and turnaround services. Their impressive industry spread includes multiple aspects of the energy industry, from their origins in traditional petrochemical and refining industries into the broader power, energy, natural gas, industrials, and emerging renewables markets. They are positioned to deploy their services into essential industries and to improve business outcomes wherever they’re called upon to do so through providing a more efficient service delivery model.

Taurus is leaning into technology in a major way, overlaying labor and staffing services with technical backing and automation. “Why do we do that?” asks CEO Hari Gopu. “Because we believe that’s how to bring value and additional capabilities to our customers.”

Those capabilities include an enviably strong engineering business covering a range of disciplines, including electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, civil and structural engineers. As part of their end-to-end approach, they’ve recently begun deploying state-of-the-art 3D laser scanning and ground-penetrating radar to expand capabilities, increase efficiency and accuracy of their services.

In a technology-driven world where many conventional companies are looking for ways to modernize, optimize, and grow, Taurus’s strategy of adding value by enhancing expertise with tech to produce stellar outcomes is particularly advantageous. By demonstrating key benefits such as increased efficiency or more uptime, “It starts taking away some of the inefficiencies and challenges that have tripped us up forever,” Gopu said. “We’re embracing a big technology push.”

Given the significant capital investments needed to embrace new technologies and equipment, companies are caught between the need to keep up with tech developments and the necessity of maintaining and operating older or legacy tech. That’s where Taurus’ diversification and integration strategies shine.

“We play across both spectrums for the services that we perform,” Gopu noted. “With the changing macro environment, many industries are going through a ‘transition,’ but these things take time so you must be able to support the old and be positioning for the new. It’s important to have the in-house personnel that can do that. Old doesn’t mean obsolete, and this is where tenure and experience become so valuable in an organization – a person that has the operating experience on a piece of equipment built in the 1960s but is equally at home on the latest app.”

Taurus is also positioning to benefit from the investment into new areas and industries, “emerging industries are seeing huge levels of investment but not necessarily the quantity of capable service providers able to meet the number of projects out there,” he said. He went on to add, “many of our services are transferrable and in a lot of cases it’s about awareness that there are companies out there like us that can provide the experience and maturity to support them.”

Taurus’ platform and strategy seek to remove inefficiencies related to provision of services that companies historically have had especially in the energy and industrials space. For example, being able to bring together multiple services in one integrated package from engineering to installation could significantly improve project control, reduce project costs (and cost increases) as well as reducing the time it takes to move a project from engineering into execution.

“There can be a lot of friction when our customers procure multiple services. Bringing multiple service providers introduces multiple points of interface and the potential for losses in the absence of some exceptionally strong project controls and coordination,” says Gopu. It can be challenge especially in the current environment with labor uncertainty, price escalations, and supply chain issues. “We've been pushing to streamline and reduce that friction, and we’re increasingly having more and more success in those areas especially through the use of technology.”

In December 2022, Taurus acquired Bolttech Mannings, experts in specialty industrial bolting and torquing, hot tapping, and thermal technologies for a variety of industries. Bolttech and its subsidiaries, Red Flame Industries, AM Inspection, and Global Tooling Services, offer a full line of OEM industrial bolting tools, induction, combustion, and resistance products. The thermal services offered through Bolttech such as leak sealing, field machining, and specialty capabilities in infrared non-destructive testing and inspection broaden Taurus’s impressive reach, making it easier for their customers to get a full range of the services they need.

“Not only can we use what Bolttech has in its arsenal, we’ve got the rest of the Taurus family that we can now offer to customers as well,” he said of the capability expansion.

Additionally, the acquisition supports Taurus’ talent development pipeline. As Gopu put it, “It’s always important to keep a watch on what’s out there in the market and what can be advantageous for us to bring in to support our company and grow, but to also support the progression and career advancement of our personnel.”

Being so diverse offers a number of different avenues for career progression. “That’s a huge advantage and hopefully a big selling point in terms of attracting new people,” he confirmed. With a significant portion of the workforce preparing to retire, getting young people excited by and invested in a career in industrial service is imperative particularly with the broader needs in infrastructure and capacity investment. “We have to be able to say we’re a great company and that we have many opportunities to support your career. We need talented people to join and stay with our company, and this industry, because there’s a lot of capital that needs to be deployed to support the future needs of the country and the economy.”

That’s another area where their tech focus is a benefit. “It’s a big selling point to some of the younger generation coming through, but it’s also a great way to cross train your existing workforce,” Gopu said. While workers with lengthy tenures in the Group’s companies may be accustomed to working “the way it’s always been,” demonstrating the value of technology brings fresh perspectives and more rapid acceptance. “It’s always rewarding to see the reaction of the older generation when they first see the benefits from new tools and methods.” He goes on, “When the initial resistance or hesitance to change is replaced with enthusiasm and excitement, and then these ‘converts’ become your most vocal supporters, that is a very cool thing to see.”

As a CEO shepherding these initiatives, Gopu actively looks for new technology and process innovations to eliminate low-value tasks. “By freeing us up from tasks that that tie us down, we have headspace to focus on things that are going to bring more value to our customers, and help us to be more agile, nimble, and responsive,” he said. “That’s hugely important in this day and age.”

The health and safety of Taurus’ people organization is absolutely critical. Without it, the business doesn’t exist. “We’re always looking for ways that we can bring new innovation or better methods, processes and practices to keep our people and customers safe in the work that we execute.”

That goes for supporting their customers’ success by supporting safety through the collection and use of actionable data. Anecdotal evidence is the platform on which choices are made in many industrial companies, but as technologies and expectations change, safety protocols based on “action X has always produced result Y” are insufficient.

Taurus uses data and technology to pinpoint potential exposures and identify mitigation strategies. “That’s extremely powerful when you can sit in front of your customers and have that type of discussion,” Gopu stressed. “The technology piece linked to health and safety is one area that we continue to push.” The company recently implemented a new real-time data reporting and tracking technology that captures granular data in the field to better assess potential risks so they can be dealt with as rapidly and effectively as possible.

Being agile and responsive in this day and age is extremely valuable, and it’s a requirement not everyone can beat, he said, adding that large organizations are tough to turn on a dime. The industry is also littered with many people that have “promised the field of dreams and fell flat on their face,” he added. As markets evolve quickly, the ability to move with them is essential, and the Taurus end-to-end approach is crafted to do just that. “Where historically it might have taken eight different contractors out there to provide a necessary multitude of services, now you're able to engage us to streamline your own operation and to look to drive efficiencies where you can,” he said.

“We don't try to be everything to everyone,” he added. He was also quick to point out that it’s not also about buying additional companies to expand your services. “Anyone can buy a new business and say they have more services. But can you actually deploy them efficiently and actually improve the overall delivery experience for your customers? That’s the challenge and not everyone can do that. It has to be in your DNA.” Taurus offers end-to-end services and can do them in-house and it positions for projects of a certain size. “We're not after the mega projects or the largest thing out there; we’re an efficient and nimble contractor for services we provide in a discrete project range, and we sit down with our customers and say, ‘This is what we can offer you and how it can give you a better outcome.’”