World class advisory
for local challenges.
For two decades we have advised governments, developers and development finance institutions on the infrastructure that Africa and the MENA region are building now.
Projects delivered across rail, energy, water and public reform
Countries with active engagements or standing presence
Practices, each led by a sector specialist
Years advising on complex infrastructure
A specialist firm, in the markets it advises.
Proficient brings together engineers, economists, policy specialists and operators who have delivered the same class of project our clients are about to start.
What separates us is not global reach. It is local depth. Our advisors live in the markets they serve, which means they understand the procurement rules, the political calendar, the utility that will actually operate the asset, and the institution that will maintain it in year fifteen.
That record spans the Cairo Monorail, the Lusail Light Rail, metro programmes in the Gulf, energy transition planning across West Africa, and governance reform from Abuja to Riyadh.
Projects delivered
Countries
Practices
Years
Projects our advisors saw through to commissioning.
We stay on the file after the strategy is signed off. Every engagement below ran through procurement, construction supervision or operator selection with our team in the room.
Fifty four kilometres of driverless monorail across two lines. Technical advisory, procurement oversight and operator readiness.
Read the caseFull lifecycle advisory on a four line tram network delivered to an immovable tournament deadline.
Read the caseTechnical advisory and operator selection for a route extension serving a new demand corridor.
Read the caseStrategic advisory on the commuter corridor linking the capital to the new city and international airport.
Read the caseFour commitments we hold to on every file.
The best advice is never imported whole. It is built from context and held to a global standard of evidence.
We are already in the market
Our advisors have spent careers inside the regulatory environments they now advise on. They know which approvals move quickly, which do not, and who has to sign.
Every recommendation carries its evidence
Demand modelling, cost benchmarking, stakeholder mapping and risk registers sit behind each position we take, and we hand them over with the report.
We stay through delivery
An engagement runs from problem definition to commissioning. The team that wrote the strategy is the team that sits in the progress meetings two years later.
We build the client team as we go
Capacity transfer is written into the scope. When we leave, the institution can run, procure and maintain the asset without us.
The thinking behind the work.
All insightsActive in fourteen countries across two regions.
From Dakar to Dubai and Casablanca to Cape Town, with standing presence in the markets where our largest programmes run and project experience in countries at every stage of infrastructure development.
Tell us what you are trying to build.
We will tell you what it takes.
A preplan is a short structured intake. You describe the challenge, we route it to the practice that has done it before, and you hear from a named advisor within two working days.
Start a preplanWe advise where
the work happens.
Proficient Projects and Advisory was built on a simple observation. The advice that changes an infrastructure outcome is written by people who live with the consequences of it.
The firm began with a small team of engineers and economists who had spent their careers on public infrastructure and had watched too many good strategies stall at implementation.
Two decades on, Proficient advises ministries, transport authorities, utilities, developers and development finance institutions across Africa and the MENA region. The team has grown to include policy specialists, procurement lawyers, transaction advisors, safeguards specialists and former operators, but the operating principle has not changed. We take on work where our people have delivered the same class of project before, and we stay on it until the asset is running.
That discipline shapes what we decline as much as what we accept. We do not bid for sectors we have not worked in, and we do not staff an engagement with people who have to learn the market on the client's time.
Our head office is in Paris, with permanent teams in Abuja and Dubai and project offices that open where a programme requires them. Work is delivered in English, French and Arabic.
Milestones that shaped the firm.
Founded in Paris by a team of infrastructure engineers and public finance economists.
First North African transport mandate. The transportation practice becomes the firm's anchor.
Gulf office opens in Dubai to support metro and light rail programmes across the region.
Abuja office opens. West African energy and public sector work becomes a standing practice.
Digital transformation and ESG established as full practices with dedicated sector leads.
Four things we will not trade away.
Independence of judgement
We are not tied to a technology, a contractor or a lender. If the honest answer is that a project should not proceed in its current form, that is the answer in the report.
Evidence over assertion
Every position we take is traceable to a model, a benchmark or a documented interview. Clients receive the working files, not only the conclusions.
Local capability transfer
Each engagement names the client staff who will hold the knowledge afterwards, and builds their involvement into the workplan from week one.
Presence, not correspondence
Advisors are in the country, on the alignment and in the steering committee. Remote oversight is not a delivery model we offer.
The people accountable for the work.
Join the firmManaging Partner
Paris
Twenty five years in rail and urban transit across North Africa and the Gulf. Leads the firm's transportation practice.
Partner, Energy
Abuja
Former utility executive. Advises on generation planning, transmission investment and electrification programmes in West Africa.
Partner, Public Sector
Abuja
Institutional reform and public investment management, with delivery unit experience in three federal governments.
Partner, Finance Advisory
Dubai
Transaction structuring and blended finance. Closed infrastructure facilities with multilateral and commercial lenders.
Director, Water and Sanitation
Casablanca
Utility performance and network expansion, with tariff reform experience across the Maghreb.
Director, ESG and Safeguards
Paris
Environmental and social safeguards, resettlement planning and lender compliance across twelve markets.
Twenty years of files.
Ask us about any of them.
We are comfortable discussing what went well and what did not. Reference calls with past clients are available on request.
Contact usEight practices.
One standard of proof.
We do not sell a method and fit the sector to it. Each practice is led by advisors who have delivered the same class of asset, under the same procurement rules, in the same markets.
Transportation and Mobility
Our largest practice. Rail, metro, light rail, monorail and urban transit, advised end to end: demand and feasibility, funding structure, procurement, construction oversight, operator selection and readiness for revenue service. Landmark programmes delivered in Egypt, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Senegal and South Africa.
Talk to the transport practiceEnergy
Advisory across the value chain, from generation and transmission planning to off grid electrification and just transition strategy. We help governments and developers design projects that reach financial close, and help utilities absorb the assets once they do.
Talk to the energy practicePublic Sector
Institutional design, delivery units, public investment management and reform programmes that survive a change of administration.
ExploreWater and Sanitation
Utility performance, network expansion, treatment capacity and tariff reform, with financing models that hold once the grant funding ends.
ExploreFinance Advisory
Bankability assessment, transaction structuring, blended finance and the evidence pack that development finance institutions actually ask for.
ExploreFood and Agro Industry
Value chain strategy, processing and storage capacity, and the logistics that decide whether a harvest reaches a market.
ExploreDigital Transformation
Systems, data and service delivery for public institutions, scoped around what the organisation can operate rather than what it can buy.
ExploreESG and Sustainability
Environmental and social safeguards, climate risk, resettlement planning and reporting that satisfies lender conditions.
ExploreThe same five stages, whatever the sector.
Each stage ends in a document your board, your ministry or your lender can act on. Nothing moves forward until that document is signed off.
Frame the real problem
Two to four weeks of interviews, site work and document review to establish what is actually constraining the outcome. Often it is not what the terms of reference said.
Test the options
Demand modelling, cost benchmarking against comparable assets, and a shortlist of routes, technologies or delivery models with the trade offs stated plainly.
Structure and fund
Delivery model, risk allocation, tariff or revenue design, and the financial case in the format the target lender or investor requires.
Procure and supervise
Tender documents, evaluation support, contract negotiation, then construction and interface supervision with monthly reporting to the client team.
Hand over an operating asset
Operator selection, readiness testing, staff capability transfer and the maintenance regime, so the institution can run the asset without us.
Not sure which practice you need?
Describe the problem instead.
Most engagements cross two or three practices. Tell us the outcome you are accountable for and we will assemble the team around it.
Start a preplanForty eight programmes.
Fourteen countries.
A selection of the engagements our advisors have carried from first study through to an operating asset. Filter by practice to see the ones closest to your own.
Cairo Monorail
Fifty four kilometres of driverless monorail across two lines, connecting the New Administrative Capital and 6th of October City. Technical advisory, procurement oversight and operator readiness.
Qatar, TransportationLusail Light Rail
Four line tram network delivered against a fixed tournament deadline. Full lifecycle advisory from systems integration through to revenue service readiness.
United Arab Emirates, TransportationDubai Metro extension
Route extension into a new demand corridor. Technical advisory, interface management with the existing network, and operator selection.
Senegal, TransportationDakar Regional Express
Commuter rail corridor linking Dakar to Diamniadio and the international airport. Strategic advisory on phasing, rolling stock and integration with bus rapid transit.
South Africa, TransportationRolling stock renewal programme
Procurement advisory on a multi year fleet replacement, including localisation requirements, maintenance regime and lifecycle cost modelling.
Nigeria, EnergyTransmission investment plan
Ten year transmission expansion plan with least cost sequencing, wheeling arrangements and a delivery unit established inside the system operator.
Ghana, EnergyOff grid electrification facility
Design and structuring of a blended finance facility for mini grid developers, with a results based subsidy mechanism and independent verification.
Nigeria, Public SectorFederal delivery unit
Design and standing up of a capital projects delivery unit, with reporting cadence, escalation protocol and a portfolio dashboard handed to permanent staff.
Morocco, Water and SanitationUrban network expansion
Utility performance review, non revenue water reduction programme and a tariff pathway agreed with the regulator and the municipality.
Your programme is not on this list.
Yet.
Tell us the outcome you are accountable for and we will show you the two or three engagements closest to it, including what they cost and how long they took.
Start a preplanResearch from the files
we are working on now.
Reports, commentary and briefings written by the advisors doing the work, not by a marketing team reading their notes.
Why light rail keeps beating bus rapid transit on political grounds
Capital cost is rarely the deciding factor. A look at how five African cities actually chose between modes.
EnergyTransmission first: sequencing the West African grid
A twenty four page assessment of where generation investment is stranded by transmission gaps.
Public SectorWhat a delivery unit is for, and what it is not
The failure mode is always the same. The unit becomes a reporting layer instead of an escalation route.
In the newsProficient comments on the Cairo network expansion
Coverage of the next phase of the capital's mass transit programme and what it means for regional supply chains.
Finance AdvisoryWhat makes a project bankable to a development finance institution
A short briefing on the eight questions that decide whether a file progresses past first screening.
Water and SanitationClosing the water financing gap in sub Saharan Africa
New models for utility investment where tariffs cannot carry the full cost of service.
ESG and SustainabilityResettlement planning is a schedule risk, not a compliance task
Where safeguards work sits in the programme plan changes how much the programme costs.
Digital TransformationBuying systems a ministry can actually operate
Procurement specifications that account for the staffing and support the institution will really have.
Where our advisors will be next.
Panel on financing structures for cross border corridors.
Closed session on transmission sequencing with regulators and system operators.
Presentation of the rail decade research and regional outlook.
One brief a month, on the sectors you choose.
No campaign sequences and no sales follow up. You pick the practices you care about, and you can leave in one click.
Short pieces,
written between meetings.
Working notes from our advisors. Less formal than a report, and usually more useful when you are three weeks from a board paper.
Why light rail keeps beating bus rapid transit on political grounds
Capital cost is rarely the deciding factor. A look at how five African cities actually chose between modes, and what the appraisal missed.
Public SectorWhat a delivery unit is for, and what it is not
The failure mode is always the same. The unit becomes a reporting layer instead of an escalation route, and nothing moves faster.
EnergyThe forty billion dollar question in West African power
Generation capacity keeps being announced. The transmission to move it does not. A note on where the sequencing goes wrong.
Finance AdvisoryThe eight questions a development finance institution asks first
Most files fail at screening for reasons that could have been fixed in the first month of preparation.
Public SectorInstitutions that outlast the programme that built them
Twenty years of reform work, and the pattern that separates the units still standing from the ones quietly dissolved.
ESG and SustainabilityResettlement planning is a schedule risk, not a compliance task
Where safeguards work sits in the programme plan changes how much the programme costs. Usually by more than the safeguards budget.
TransportationOperator selection is a design decision, not a procurement one
Deciding who will run the system after the ribbon is cut should shape the system specification, not follow it.
EnergyMini grids and the subsidy that has to expire
Results based subsidies work. Designing their exit at the same time is what keeps the market from collapsing when they end.
Finance AdvisoryCurrency risk is the quiet killer of African infrastructure
Revenue in local currency, debt in hard currency, and a twenty five year horizon. How the better structures handle it.
New posts, once a month,
in your inbox.
Pick the practices you follow and we will send you only those. One email, no sequences.
Subscribe to the briefWhere our advisors
are quoted, and why.
Press coverage, interviews and commentary. For media enquiries, our press contact is at the bottom of this page.
Our managing partner on operator readiness and why commissioning schedules keep slipping.
ReadFindings from the Proficient rail research picked up in a review of corridor investment plans.
ReadThe next phase of the capital's mass transit programme and what it means for regional supply chains.
ReadSummary of the session on risk allocation between neighbouring states on shared rail assets.
ReadOur water director on designing tariff pathways that regulators can actually approve.
ReadPress contact
We respond to media enquiries within one working day and can usually make a sector lead available for comment on request.
Press kit
Firm description, leadership biographies, project fact sheets and brand assets, including the logo in vector form.
Long form research,
free to download.
Each report is built from project data our advisors gathered on live engagements. We ask for an email address so we can tell you when the analysis is updated.
Africa's rail decade: what has to be decided before 2030
Forty eight pages on corridor economics, gauge decisions, rolling stock localisation and the financing structures that have actually reached close.
Download the report
Enter your details and the PDF opens immediately. We will not pass your address to anyone.
The rest of the library.
Transmission first: sequencing the West African grid
Where generation investment is stranded by transmission gaps, and what a least cost sequence would look like across five markets.
Water and SanitationClosing the water financing gap in sub Saharan Africa
New models for utility investment in markets where tariffs cannot carry the full cost of service.
Public SectorTwenty years of public reform: what held
A retrospective on reform programmes across nine countries and the institutional features that survived a change of government.
Finance AdvisoryStructuring bankable infrastructure
A working framework for preparing files that pass development finance screening, with worked examples from three closed transactions.
ESG and SustainabilitySafeguards as schedule: the cost of late resettlement planning
Quantifying the programme delay attributable to safeguards work started after design freeze.
TransportationOperator readiness: the last eighteen months
What has to be true before revenue service, drawn from four network openings in the region.
Before the terms of reference,
there is the problem.
A preplan is a short structured intake. It takes about three minutes, commits you to nothing, and puts your challenge in front of the advisors who have handled it before.
Three steps from you, four from us.
Submissions are read by a partner, not a mailbox. If your challenge sits outside what we have genuinely done before, we will say so and point you to someone better placed.
Step 1 of 3
Who are you representing?
Step 2 of 3
Which practice is closest to the challenge?
Step 3 of 3
How should we reach you?
Preplan received
A partner will read this today. You will hear from a named advisor within two working days, and we will confirm which practice is picking it up.
Read our latest research while you waitThree offices,
one inbox that is read.
If you are bringing us a project, the preplan form routes you faster. For everything else, this page reaches the right desk.
Dubai
Gulf and MENA
Proficient Projects & Advisory
Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Everything else
General enquiries
Media, partnerships, procurement notices and supplier registration.
Send us a note.
Enquiries are triaged each morning. Project enquiries are forwarded to the relevant practice lead, media enquiries to our press desk, and everything else to the office nearest you.
The work is difficult
and it is in the field.
We hire people who want to be on the alignment, in the ministry and in the steering committee, not writing decks about them from another continent.
You own a file, not a slide
Consultants here carry an engagement from framing to commissioning. You will still be on the project when the first train runs.
Access to decisions
Our teams are small, so analysts sit in the same steering committees as the partners and present their own work.
Real mobility across markets
Programmes run in fourteen countries and three languages. Moving between them is normal, and it is how sector leads are built.
Training that costs the firm something
Professional qualifications, language tuition and secondments to client teams are funded, with time protected in the workplan.
Open roles.
Dubai or Cairo
Full time, eight years and above
ApplyAbuja
Full time, five years and above
ApplyAbuja or Paris
Full time, three years and above
ApplyParis
Full time, graduate entry
ApplyCasablanca
Full time, six years and above
ApplyThe expert network.
We keep a standing roster of independent specialists we call on for specific mandates. Signalling systems, tariff regulation, resettlement, procurement law, operations readiness.
Register once and we will contact you when a mandate matches your experience. There is no exclusivity and no obligation to accept.