Business

Wednesday September 16, 2009

SBM sees RM100m revenue


KUALA LUMPUR: SBM Malaysia Sdn Bhd, an oil and gas support services company, expects to derive RM100mil in revenue from the US$1.2bil floating, production, storage and offloading (FPSO) Aseng contract won by its parent company SBM Offshore N.V.

SBM Malaysia’s portion of the project includes engineering, procurement and project management services for FPSO Aseng that will be in operation in 2012 with the capability of processing 80,000 barrels of oil per day.

The US$1.2bil contract awarded to SBM Offshore by US listed company Noble Energy and its partners is for the 15-year lease and operation contract for FPSO Aseng that will be deployed in Equatorial Guinea in West Africa.

According to SBM Offshore Contractors Inc South East Asia director Ivan Replumaz, the group has not decided where to construct the FPSO yet, but is seriously considering Keppel Shipyard in Singapore.

Ivan Replumaz at the media briefing.

“But, Malaysia Marine and Heavy Engineering Sdn Bhd has also shown interest,” he said after a media briefing on the FPSO Aseng project yesterday.

The Aseng project will include the conversion of an existing tanker into a FPSO where works will include new topside fabrication, integration, transport to site and commissioning.

SBM Malaysia chief financial officer Pierre Savy said it was the first time the company was taking responsibility for a project of this size since it was set up in June 2006.

“FPSO Aseng project will form a substantial part of our workload for the next 18 months and we will increase our workforce too,” he said. Replumaz said there would be other future work as the group was also bidding for other oil and gas projects in the region and some of the work would trickle down to SBM Malaysia.

“At the moment we are bidding for FPSO HaiSu Trang in Veitnam, floating storage and offloading Cepu in Indonesia and tension leg platform Malikai in Malaysia.

“In addition to that, SBM Malaysia will also be involved in the FPSO CLOV in Angola if we win the project,” he said, adding that globally, the group had also tendered for significant jobs in Brazil, Mexico and Russia.

Going forward, Replumaz said the FPSP Aseng project also indicated the uptrend in the oil and gas industry where it was the first FPSO project awarded globally since August 2008.

“The about one-year lull was due to the global economic crisis and the plunge in oil prices earlier this year. But now, I think we have reached the rock bottom and the industry is slowly picking up with the oil price having returned to above US$70 per barrel level,” he said.

SBM Malaysia is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Monaco-based SBM Offshore. SBM Offshore recorded a net profit of US$227.9mil last year and the group has a presence in 15 countries.

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