Company Insight

50 years providing world-class solutions

Tell us about Arpa and how long you have been around as organisation?

ARPA EMC is a company specialized in providing solutions for the defence sector, civil sector, health, emergencies and catastrophes. We design projects from scratch, from the design, development and engineering to the production, deployment, maintenance and training. We strive to deliver healthcare wherever is needed, developing projects with the latest technologies. ARPA EMC is a family business, founded by Antonio Arpa in 1968 with the clear vocation to improve the feeding conditions of the Spanish Armed Forces in their field deployments.

For many years we have been developing new solutions adapted in different platforms such as containers, tents and trailers. And those solutions where more technological and efficient every time we developed new projects.

The services you provide, who is your targeted market within defence?

Within the defence sector, we aim our solutions to every military or paramilitary forces anywhere in the world that have to develop their activities in remote areas or places with difficult access. We provide them sheltering, water management, feeding solutions, energy… Usually we work together with the ministry of health of the armed forces of the countries to provide healthcare. Field hospitals from role I to III.

Tell us about some of your success stories over the past few years in the defence sector?

During the last few years we had several contracts with different countries all over the world. We manufactured 125 ARPA 2000 kitchens to the Brazilian Army. We signed 2 contracts with Argelia to supply 373 fridges in containers and 68 mobile kitchens to Argelia. We have provided a habitability system for the Chilean-Argentine Peace force. But our most ambitious project was developed during 2015-2016, this project is the biggest contract in the world history of field hospitals. We’re talking about 7 field hospitals on truck, every hospital comprises 55 containers, 29 trucks and 26 trailers. These hospitals were tailor made to the ministry of health of Saudi Arabia. The hospital is provided with the most technological equipment and was designed from scratch by ARPA, adapting their specific needs with our experience, we have developed the best and most technological field hospital ever made.

As an organisation, what continent would you say that you have had the most success, in generating business from?

I would have to say Central and South America. We work in almost every country in this continent, we have supply those countries with water treatment plants, emergency hospitals, mobile units, ambulatories and housing for rural areas, we have sent help for the population relief after earthquakes in Chile and hurricanes in Haiti. Our modular construction buildings and shelters for social housing are giving good quality of life to many people all over Guatemala, Colombia, Mexico… We have modular construction universities and schools in many of these countries and we have delivered our solutions to the most remote area in most of these countries. The language and how close we feel to all of these countries has helped us to maintain a tight and good relationship with all of them, but also our knowhow and dedication to every one of these projects.

But we have worked very well also with African countries. Algeria, Somalia, Morocco, Centro African Republic…those are just a few countries where we have deployed our solutions and help them to achieve an answer for many of the problems that were presented to us, because as I told before, we’re not only a company that sells products….we give advice and develop the projects adapted to what is really needed in the area, providing training to local people so they can manage the deployments and solutions by themselves.