Stena Drilling Agrees On Option To Buy Drillship From Samsung

Offshore drilling contractor Stena Drilling has entered into a purchase option agreement with South Korea’s Samsung Heavy Industries for the acquisition of a newbuild drillship.

According to Stena Drilling, this purchase option agreement with Samsung Heavy Industries gives Stena “the possibility to offer the market a state-of-the-art drilling service with a minimal carbon footprint.”

“Our plan is to fit the drillship according to our specifications with hybrid technologies including the use of batteries. If we find a suitable contract, we will use the option to buy the unit,” Erik Ronsberg, CEO of Stena Drilling, said.

Stena Drilling already has four drillships in its fleet – the Stena Forth, Stena Carron, Stena IceMax, and the Stena DrillMax – along with two semi-submersibles.

Samsung just recently agreed to sell a drillship ordered by Ocean Rig all the way back in 2014. The order was canceled by Transocean after it acquired Ocean Rig. The drillship will now be sold to an unnamed European firm for $245 million.

It will be delivered in the first quarter of 2023, but the order must be confirmed by mid-October 2022. In case the order is not confirmed, Samsung can cancel the buy and keep a $15 million deposit.

There was another Ocean Rig that Samsung had in stock, named Santorini. This one has been delivered to Saipem following a charter agreement with the Italian company. Currently, Samsung has three more drillships in stock. The company previously stated it was looking to sell all of them as soon as possible.

The relationship between Stena Drilling and Samsung also is not rosy, as the South Korean company lost a dispute with the driller over a rig construction deal termination.

The dispute was over a harsh environment semi-submersible drilling unit, what was supposed to be the Stena MidMAX, ordered in 2013. It was canceled by Stena in June 2017 due to excessive delay. Due to Stena coming out on top in the dispute, the shipyard had to pay $411 million to the driller.

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