Petrobras to name drillship winner

Petrobras is set to award just one of the contractual packages on offer for building seven drillships per Brazilian shipyard, a director with the company confirmed today.


Gareth Chetwynd 14 December 2010 16:20 GMT

“We will be ruling on some final disqualification appeals today, then negotiations should begin with the lowest bidder,” engineering director Renato Duque told reporters at Petrobras headquarters.

The lowest bid of $4.65 billion, was presented by Estaleiro Atlantico Sul, edging out second-placed Alusa Galvao, with $4.68 billion.

“In principle only one of these seven-rig contracts will be awarded,” Duque said.

If confirmed, this Petrobras stance will also leave Keppel Fels ($5.17 billion), Jurong Shipyard ($5.18 billion) and Odebrecht-OAS-UTC ($5.31 billion) out in the cold.

Petrobras is now close to concluding its tenders for up to 28 Brazilian-built ultra-deepwater rigs, but the first attempt seems certain to produce a more modest number

Duque added that possible awards in an additional category for up two more Petrobras-owned rigs - one per yard - were still under analysis. EAS was also the lowest bidder in this category, offering a drillship, while Keppel Fels was second, with a semi-submersible.

Duque also suggested that the Petrobras E&P division was still keeping its options open for contracting chartered rigs under a parallel tender, also specifiying that construction must be in Brazil.

Most Brazilian industry sources have predicted that the parallel tender for the chartered units will be cancelled after bidders offered dayrates averaging nearly $700,000

Petrobras intends to contract a total of 28 ultra-deepwater rigs for construction in Brazil, to be delivered between 2014 and 2017.

It has been suggested that a Dutch-registered arm of Petrobras is planning to open more flexible negotiations with shipyards that participated in the tender, possibly ordering fewer rigs per facility. A re-tender process may also be considered.

The rig tender, as originally formatted, was intended to offer the commercial foundations to encourage new shipyard projects.

The EAS consortium has built a major shipyard in the north-eastern state of Pernambuco, although some infrastructure investments are still pending.