SapuraCrest, Ramunia riding high on oil jobs
The Star
18 January 2006

Kuala Lumpur: Two oil and gas players, SapuraCrest Petroleum Bhd and Ramunia Holdings Bhd, yesterday announced securing major contracts related to the industry worth US$120mil (RM444mil) and RM90mil respectively.

SapuraCrest said its 51%-owned unit Tioman Drilling Co Sdn Bhd had been awarded a contract from Carigali-Triton Operating Co Sdn Bhd (CTOC) for the provision of two drilling units- Teknik Berkat and a new mobile drilling vessel, known as T-10 – to CTOC.

“Teknik Berkat and T-10 shall be deployed for work under the contract for 18 and 36 months respectively,” the company said in a circular to Bursa Malaysia.

Tioman is a joint venture between SapuraCrest and Norway’s Smedvig group.

Concurrent with the award of this contract, SapuraCrest, through its 51%-owned subsidiary Crest Tender Rigs Pte Ltd, has awarded a contract worth US$48.8mil to Malaysia Marine and Heavy Engineering Sdn Bhd to construct T-10.

Ramunia said its wholly-owned subsidiary, Ramunia Fabricators Sdn Bhd, has secured an oil and gas fabrication contract from Sarawak Shell Bhd worth RM90mil.

This came less than three months after the company was awarded a contract by Petronas Carigali Sdn Bhd to build an oil and gas platform.

The group, which is principally involved in the fabrication of offshore oil and gas related structures for major oil players in the region, expects the projects to contribute positively to earnings for the financial year ending Oct 31.

Ramunia told Bursa Malaysia yesterday the letter of award from Sarawak Shell was for the fabrication of topsides of an oil and gas platform offshore Sarawak.

“The contract will take about 14 months to complete from the award date of Jan 13,” it added.

On Oct 19, Ramunia Fabricators clinched a RM115mil contract from Petronas Carigali for the engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning of Abu “A” minimal integrated production platform of the Abu Cluster development project located offshore Terengganu.

Ramunia Managing Director Arshad Ahmad told StarBiz the group expected to secure more overseas oil and gas contracts.

“The outlook of the sector remains positive. We expect our turnover to double this year,” he said.

Arshad said the group had allocated a sizeable amount of capital this year and the bulk of it would be used to upgrade its fabrication facility in Teluk Ramunia in Johor. “We are upgrading our Teluk Ramunia yard by installing state-of-the-art equipment by the end of the year. It is the single biggest oil and gas fabrication yard in the world.”

The 100-acre yard, set up in 1982, has the capacity to undertake steel fabrication of offshore platforms of up to 30,000 tonnes. Projects completed at the yard include marine structures, jackets, topsides, modules, living quarters, chemical plants and steel structure fabrications.

On the group’s target this year, Arshad said it would be to improve operational efficiencies.

“We are bidding for more international oil and gas projects. They are estimated to be worth more than RM1bil. To make our presence felt in the Middle East, we have just set up a subsidiary company called Ramunia Arabia,” he said, adding that the group had also announced plans to expand its core business to India, China, Indonesia and Thailand.

Arshad said the Ramunia group was also making arrangements for a transfer of listing from the second to the main board of Bursa Malaysia.

“We expect to transfer our listing status by year-end or early next year. We aim to be a professional oil and gas service provider of choice not only for the domestic market, but also international by 2010,” Arshad said.

The group invited on board former founder of Hyundai Heavy Industries offshore and engineering division, Dr Daniel C.S. Ahn, as executive director last year to further boost its standing in the international oil and gas arena.