Saudi Electricity Company has acquired a new name, a new look and, for fuck’s sake, a soundtrack. The utility launched its Saudi Energy identity on 26 February 2026. By June, Interbrand and sonic branding agency Sixième Son were introducing the transformation internationally. A national electricity company can apparently no longer express itself adequately through electricity. It needs an emotional experience when you ring customer services.
Interbrand’s announcement says the new brand honours a “trusted legacy”. That is an ambitious phrase to leave unattended near the US Department of Justice’s archive. The Saudi Electricity Company bribery history sits in facts Alstom admitted in a 2014 criminal case, including payments to relatives of senior SEC officials. Meanwhile, Cummins has its own flattering account of the customer. Put the material together and the bastards have supplied everything required for a much less comfortable retrospective.
Seventy-Two Generators And A Very Happy Supplier
Cummins’ case study takes us to Turbah, western Saudi Arabia, where it describes an isolated township dependent on the local power plant. SEC awarded Cummins Olayan Energy, the Cummins and Olayan joint venture, a five-year rental contract in 2005. Another five-year deal followed in April 2010. Sales departments fucking love that sort of relationship: substantial demand, repeat business and a customer whose satisfaction can help sell the next deal.
The fleet reached 71 sets after that renewal. Adding a QSK95 in 2014 took it to 72, with a stated total capacity of 90.25 MW and a 63 MW continuous rating. Cummins praised the fuel consumption, maintenance intervals and performance. A product flyer revised in May 2025 still featured the Turbah installation and its 72 sets. That is one hell of a long promotional life for a satisfied customer. The old success story was still working its arse off in the brochure.
The Other Meaning Of A Close Relationship
Alstom had a success story about SEC too. In May 2012, it celebrated completing the Shoaiba III power plant ahead of schedule. Its press release quoted SEC’s then chief executive praising “mutual trust and understanding”. There was plenty of congratulation about the relationship behind the engineering. Read on its own, the release offers the familiar corporate wank of two large companies applauding each other until the reader’s teeth ache.
Then open the admitted facts concerning the first two Shoaiba projects. They describe consultants used to benefit officials who could influence contract awards. Turbah is the Cummins installation; Shoaiba is the Alstom project history. The customer connects these records. SEC appears in one supplier’s celebration of dependable power and in another supplier’s admissions about corrupt payments. That makes the cheery language about relationships considerably harder to swallow. The brochure has a handshake; the court file explains why you should check the bloody fingers.
Five Million For The Brother
The consultant called “Mr. Geneva” was a senior SEC official’s brother and received approximately $5 million. “Mr. Paris”, a close relative of another senior SEC official, received at least $4 million. Alstom admitted it lacked documentation of legitimate work or expertise commensurate with those fees. Payments on that scale demand a better fucking explanation than a family connection and a documentary shrug. Somewhere between the org chart and the family tree, procurement had become a very expensive exercise in knowing the right people.
Those geographical aliases are a particularly stupid little flourish. They make the paperwork sound like a spy thriller written by a purchasing department that has discovered room service. Strip away the bullshit and the relevant detail is brutally ordinary: access to officials with power over contracts. Millions went to their relatives. A serious account of this customer’s history has to accommodate that fact, however badly it clashes with the approved vocabulary of partnership and trust.
The Paperwork Could Catch Up Later
Another consultant, “London”, received at least $30 million. Alstom admitted that the limited records of his services were produced retrospectively with employees’ help. A September 2000 email supplies the flavour: “probably you need to create an agreement for your auditors as done before??” What a helpful little sentence. Apparently the agreement could arrive after the activity, like an understudy shoved onstage to explain where the lead actor had fucked off to.
The two question marks are doing magnificent work. An auditor needs something to inspect, and here is an invitation to create it. Here is the really grubby shit inside the case: the appearance of an explanation could be assembled after the money had moved. Reading that beside a supplier’s celebration of careful engineering is enough to make you grind your teeth. You would never accept a generator specification produced backwards to fit whatever happened to emerge from the machine. Yet the commercial paperwork was allowed to perform precisely that sort of arse-covering gymnastics.
Alstom’s $772 Million Reckoning
Alstom S.A. pleaded guilty on 22 December 2014 to falsifying its books and records and failing to maintain adequate internal controls under the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. On 13 November 2015, it was sentenced to a $772,290,000 criminal fine for the wider international case, which included Saudi Arabia. Saudi procurement formed one documented part of that much larger business of buying influence and disguising the payments.
The Justice Department also recorded Alstom’s eventual thorough cooperation. That followed several years of refusing to cooperate fully and came after prosecutors publicly charged several executives. Give the subsequent cooperation its proper place in the record. Then give the preceding refusal its place too. Corporate accountability becomes a load of bollocks if every eventual improvement requires everyone else to forget the pressure that came first. What a fucking bargain that would be. A guilty plea preserves facts for future readers; it does not come with an instruction to stop mentioning them once the company feels ready to move on.
Play The New Music Over This
Saudi Energy’s official launch presented the new identity as part of a broader energy role, while affirming continuity in the business and its regulatory framework. Fine. Companies develop, and their presentation changes with them. But anyone selling continuity as a virtue should expect continuity of scrutiny. The public is entitled to be an awkward bastard about what gets included in that legacy. This audience has brought something more useful than the brand guidelines.
Cummins’ May 2025 flyer keeps the old customer success story available. The 2026 branding gives the company a fresh presentation. Alongside both sit Alstom’s criminal admissions about relatives, millions and retrospectively assembled paperwork. That is the reminder the rebranded company gets from Customer Corner. Enjoy the new identity, you cheeky fuckers. Pick the colours, perfect the customer-service music and explain the expanded business. We will still be here reading the documents when the jingle stops.
Lee Thompson – Founder, The Cummins Accountabilit Project
Sources
- Saudi Press Agency – Saudi Electricity Company launches its Saudi Energy identity, 26 February 2026.
- Interbrand – SE Saudi Energy’s international brand introduction and sonic identity, 17 June 2026.
- Cummins – QSK95 Series shows its value at Saudi power plant, 2014 case history.
- Cummins – QSK95 Series product flyer, revised May 2025.
- Alstom – Shoaiba III completion announcement, 8 May 2012.
- US Department of Justice – Alstom S.A. plea agreement and admitted facts, 22 December 2014; Saudi section, paragraphs 57-74.
- US Department of Justice – Alstom sentencing, 13 November 2015.