ENGINEER Amec Foster Wheeler, which employs more than 1,000 staff across the North-East, has bought a Scottish company which works in the oil and gas industry.

Scopus Group, which is headquartered in Aberdeen, employs 200 staff providing survey data used to engineer piping and structures for the global oil and gas sector.

The business said Scopus will continue to offer independent services to its clients while building on Amec Foster Wheeler's presence in 50 countries and customer base.

"This acquisition forms part of our growth strategy by further strengthening our project delivery capability across the upstream, midstream and downstream oil and gas sectors," said Amec Foster Wheeler spokesman, Alan Johnstone.

Amec, which has its European engineering base in Darlington, completed its £2bn takeover of Foster Wheeler last month.

In the meantime, the group has been awarded a FEED (Front End Engineering Design) contract by Chevron to work on a development in the North Sea.

The work on the field, which is 68 miles offshore north of Aberdeen, includes design of the proposed Bridge Linked Platform (BLP) which will be used to store, mix and pump polymer.