Kvaerner Oil And Gas News

ABIS Projects has won a clutch of contracts worth around £1million over the next 15 months. The oil and gas project services consultancy has secured frame agreements and call-off contracts with ADTI, Hunting, Talisman Sinopec and North Sea newcomer, MOL. Aberdeen-based ABIS Projects is working with these new clients providing multi-discipline resources covering business strategy, acquisitions, risk, projects and management systems across the supply chain. Francis Kiernan, who acquired an interest in ABIS Projects earlier this year, said: “With the considerable drop in oil price, the focus in the North Sea once again turns to innovative ways of working which will deliver cost-efficiencies and greater value. A one size fits all approach is no longer sustainable.

Kvaerner, has launched a new company with 18,000 employees in 17 countries and on five continents. The new company, to be known as 'Aker Kvaerner', will supply products, services, technology and solutions worth NOK 20 billion a year to the global oil and gas industry. Aker Kvaerner is the result of a merger between Aker Maritime and Kvaerner Oil & Gas, and forms one of four business areas within the Kvaerner Group. Subsidiaries of Aker Kvaerner have already won contracts totalling NOK 15.5 billion since the start of 2002, almost doubling the Group's order backlog in just over two months. The many companies embraced by the new organisation…

Norwegian industrialist Kjell Inge Roekke proposed merging his Aker firms with the shipbuilding and oil and gas divisions of Kvaerner on Wednesday to combat stiffening world competition. Aker forecast synergies from 2003 worth $89-$112 million, from the link-ups, the latest in a string of proposed ties between the two groups, which are struggling in a dwindling Norwegian oil and gas services market. "We expect that most of Kvaerner's shareholders will accept this," said Roekke, a billionaire investor whose interests range from fisheries to building oil platforms. Kvaerner welcomed proposed talks on shipbuilding but reacted frostily to the suggested tie-up in oil and gas, saying it would not help the company to meet future challenges. It said Aker over-estimated synergies.

Aker Maritime, which wants wide-ranging link-ups with Kvaerner, proposed a new board for Kvaerner before a corporate showdown on Friday. Aker, the top shareholder in Kvaerner with 17.8 percent, put forward Pehr Gyllenhammar, chairman of Britain's biggest insurance group CGNU, as chairman of its proposed board. Kvaerner has said it opposes Aker's plans for link-ups. Gyllenhammar said he hoped he could help resolve the clash between the two Norwegian industrial groups but stressed he would be independent. "The new board will have a completely free rein to assess the best strategy for Kvaerner," he said. Last month, Kvaerner's own election committee proposed a new board led by former Christiania Bank chairman Harald Arnkvaern.

Statoil has awarded Aker Maritime two large contracts for maintenance and modification work on its fields in the Tampen area of the North Sea and the Halten Bank/Nordland area of the Norwegian Sea. Including options, the contracts run for up to 11 years, and have a combined value of around $1 billion. The contracts consist of frame agreements for the maintenance and modification work to be carried out on the installations operated by Statoil in both the Tampen area and the Halten Bank/Nordland area. The Tampen area includes the Statfjord A, B and C platforms and the Gullfaks A, B and C platforms. The options cover work on the Snorre TLP, Snorre B and Visund platforms when Statoil takes over as operator of these fields.

The Norwegian Competition Authority has cleared the merger of Aker Maritime and Kværner's oil and gas activities. The authority has approved the merger without reservations, on the basis that the merged company will not have the opportunity of exercising market power through deliveries of new buildings and maintenance services to oil companies operating on the Norwegian continental shelf. The Competition Authority concludes that following the merger there will still be sufficient competition from foreign players, and the oil companies which are active in Norway have significant purchasing power. Except for clearance in the US, which in this case is expected to pose no problems, this is the final approval required from the authorities.