Stena Drilling, a subsidiary of Sweden’s Stena, has emerged as the European owner behind last week’s stock market announcement from South Korea’s Samsung Heavy Industries regarding a drillship sale.
Clarksons identified the Aberdeen-based driller as the buyer of one of the two stranded drillships that were originally ordered by Ocean Rig and subsequently relinquished by Transocean. The deal is worth around $245m and came with a deposit of $15m.
Stena Drilling already operates four drillships, all of which were built by Samsung Heavy. The company also had a semisub on order at Samsung but the deal fell through in 2017 due to excessive delays and the South Korean shipbuilder was ordered to pay $411m.
The second drillship from Samsung’s inventory was chartered to Saipem in June. The Italian energy services contractor has booked the rig for two years, with the option to buy. Financial details surrounding this deal were not disclosed.
