Deep Ocean

Source: Energy Digital

Date :13/11/2007 07:16:31

Deep sea expertise

With major long-term plans, DeepOcean ASA is a company with an extensive

subsea services portfolio. ExecUK finds out more about the company’s confidence in a growing market

Written by Lucy Mowatt and Produced by Alex Smith

Kåre Johannes Lie, MD, Arne Wathne, COO and Rolf Ivar Sørdal, Commercial Director, are keen to emphasise their company’s expertise and where it plans to go from here. Indeed, Kåre Johannes and Arne were two of the company’s co-founders in 1999. Since then, they explain, the company has developed significantly, as client demands have changed.

Mr Lie says: “We started as a subsea services company, which we still are – but the needs of customers are changing.” The company can now offer a completely integrated service to clients. This is from the chartering of ships to the trenching and laying of flexible pipes. The company describes its main functions as Seabed Mapping and Survey services, Inspection, Maintenance and Repair (IMR) for deep sea installations and finally, Trenching Services. To undertake such operations DeepOcean has access to a pool of Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs), which can carry out specialised subsea tasks.

Ongoing contracts

The company has a number of significant contracts currently underway; the most significant at the moment is the IMR contract for StatoilHydro. This contract will involve most of DeepOcean’s main functions when working for the oil company, using three vessels in Norway, one of which will be replaced by a new ship in 2008. The experience gained working on this contract has attracted a number of other key clients, including Petrobras.

The two year contract for Petrobras will be carried out in Brazil, with the option for a further two year extension. The contract will be carried out in partnership with Comphania Brasileira de Offshore and is worth in the region of US$50 million. They will supply and operate a Multipurpose Platform Support Vessel (MPSV) to ssist Petrobras’ subsea operations.

This contract has been accompanied by the establishment of an office in Brazil. Mr Sørdal explains: “There are brokers and agents in these countries – but it’s in markets like these that we think our presence is needed. As such, we’d rather move in there.” Similar moves have also been made in India, where it has a contract for Reliance Industries Limited. It is in the process of setting up an office in Mumbai and a base office in Kikinada in order to be close to the customer and oversee the market closely.

Ownership structure

DeepOcean ASA is listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange and currently has approximately 700 shareholders. 17 percent of these shares are held by Østensjø, a local Norwegian ship owner and operator. Another eight percent is held by the former owner of the UK company CTC Marine Projects Ltd., which DeepOcean acquired 100 percent ownership of in 2006. The rest of the shares are held by private investors. DeepOcean today hires several of its vessels from Østensjø.

700 people work for DeepOcean and its subsidiaries directly, while it employs another 60 contractors to carry out extra work on larger contracts and to level off seasonal changes. These employees are specialists in their field, and the company encourages the development of their careers. Arne Wathne explains: “At the moment we have 45 trainees being educated as ROV Pilots and Technicians. Their training process will take two years – and they have typically started out with an electronic, electrical or engineering background. We want to ensure that they become skilled operators and to secure that experience is passed on to the younger people in the company.” This training is specialised and often ongoing, with constant monitoring and assessment.

He goes on to explain that it is not just on the vessels that the company offers its employees training. Wathne continues to say that even those in administrative, financial and onshore engineering roles are encouraged to undergo training, because learning is fundamental to the company.

In addition to being offered training, holiday and sick pay, DeepOcean employees also have access to a bonus scheme. The vessels and locations are also safe and are compliant with ISO 18001 standards. All offshore employees have to attend mandatory health and safety training courses and standards are continuously monitored. Management meetings address any incidents that have occurred on projects or on administrative sites in order to identify how they could be avoided.

Rolf Ivar Sørdal continues: “There’s a continuous focus on HSE matters and we are committed to making DeepOcean a top performer on HSE issues, meeting our own goals and those of our clients. We cooperate with our clients to discuss health and safety matters.” He also explains that they implement high-visibility campaigns, where posters are distributed. This ensures that HSE awareness is kept in mind by every employee.

High standards

The company owns two vessels and charters a number of other ships from companies such as Østensjø. There are plans to increase both the number of vessels that the company owns and the number that it hires. The company also has a specialist engineering department, which looks at upgrading equipment and processes to ensure that they are modern and efficient. Arne Wathne says that DeepOcean is proud of its technical capabilities: “We protect our ideas and we put effort into developing new designs, equipment and procedures.”

DeepOcean also works closely with ship owners, like Østensjø, and ROV manufacturers in order to develop the next generation of ships and ROVs. This will mean that future vessels and equipment will be even better suited to meet its customer’s needs.

Offering services to the international Oil & Gas industry means that the company is subject to strict quality requirements from its clients too. Thus, the company holds the ISO 9001:2000 quality assurance certificate. Mr Wathne says: “There’s a continuous focus on quality matters, and we are audited on a regular basis by certification entities such as Det Norske Veritas. This means that our operations must always comply with the standards set.”

Kåre Johannes Lie picks up on this: “We are also audited by our customers.” These standards and client specific requirements are always written into the contracts and have to be met. Mr Sørdal explains that the company is also approved by the FPAL system in the UK. This is a pre-qualification system for contractors in the oil and gas industry. It is also compliant with a similar system in Norway called Achilles.

The company is now working towards attaining the ISO 14001 environmental certificate. The COO explains one of the strategies being implemented in order to gain the certificate. He says: “One of the biggest problems for Mother Nature is the exhaust fumes from our ships. We are currently building two new vessels which have cleaning mechanisms built-in. These will reduce the amount of waste gas emitted into the atmosphere.”

In addition, all of the company’s equipment is modern and meets current quality and environmental standards. The company is focusing on training its people in these issues as well as preparing them to meet customers’ future needs. The company’s revenues are expected to exceed NOK 2 billion in 2007, a substantial increase. In the long-term the company is looking for new markets and new assets, which will enable expansion. Mr Wathne concludes positively: “We are optimistic about the market – it is growing and we expect this to continue.”