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High-end Platform to Meet Demand of Soaring Offshore Engineering Industry

Published Apr 26, 2012 4:21 PM by The Maritime Executive

The much anticipated Medium and Long-Term Program for the Development of Offshore Engineering Equipment Manufacturing Industry (hereinafter referred to as “the Program”) has recently been released jointly by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Science and Technology, the State-Owned Asset Supervision and Administration Commission and the State Oceanic Administration. The Program set forth the following four objectives:

  1. To become one of the leading suppliers in the world: to increase sales income to over 200 billion yuan and take up 20% of the world’s offshore oil and gas development equipment market by year 2015. By year 2020, the sales income is expected to exceed 400 billion yuan and the market share to top 35%.
  2. To form three major industry clusters and 5-6 large mainstay enterprise groups.
  3. To enhance technology and innovation capacities.
  4. To significantly improve the ability of manufacturing key systems and equipment: by  year 2015, homemade key systems and equipment for offshore oil and gas development are expected to meet 30% of the domestic demand and by year 2020, the ratio is expected to top 50%.

To achieve the above goals, the Program specified several major tasks including accelerating expansion of industry scales, stepping up technology innovations, increasing domestic supply of key systems and equipment, building up modern manufacturing system for offshore engineering equipment and opening up more to international investment.

Right now, China’s offshore engineering industry is still in the growing stage. With the improvement of their offshore engineering technologies, many Chinese enterprises have entered the international markets and have received large orders from abroad. The recent issuance of the Program has made offshore engineering enterprises feel more pressed to make technical breakthroughs and therefore they need more opportunities and high-end platforms to expand their visions and determine their development directions.  

Highlights of the Upcoming High-end Event of Offshore Engineering Industry 
The issuance of the Program coincides with the key period for China’s development of the offshore engineering equipment industry that is expected in the coming 5-10 years. To prepare for the arrival of the offshore oil and gas era, China (Beijing) International offshore Oil and Gas Technology Conference and Exhibition 2012 (CIOTC 2012) will have a Pavilion for Offshore Oil and Gas Development Technologies and Equipment. Concurrent events include China International Offshore Technology Conference 2012, introduction between Chinese and foreign enterprises that are potential business partners, a number of seminars or workshops, etc. To help participants to expose more to the international market, CIOTC 2012 invites dozens of top industry media from around the world including Upstream, Rigzone, World Oil, Energy Asia, Offshore and Interfax to cover the event and make interviews. 

Well-known Chinese Offshore Equipment Manufacturers See Soaring Orders
In February, CIMC Raffles, a subsidiary of China International Marine Containers (Group) Ltd.(000039) signed the general engineering and construction contract for North Dragon, a deepwater semi-submersible drilling platform to be used on the North Sea. This is another order for a deepwater semi-submersible drilling platform to be used on the North Sea that CIMC Raffles has signed after the general contract for COSLProspector signed two months ago. CIMC Raffles will be responsible for designing, purchasing of materials and the whole set of equipment, construction, debugging, drilling package testing, etc for North Dragon. It’s the first time for a Chinese contractor to undertake all the above work for a semi-submersible drilling platform project. North Dragon is the 5th deepwater semi-submersible drilling platform that CIMC Raffles has contracted that can be used on the North Sea off the coast of Norway. Three of the previous four are already hired by Norsk Statoil.  

On March 8, China National Offshore Oil Corporation(CNOOC) and CSSC Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding Co., Ltd. signed a contract in Beijing to join hands to build the Zhong Hai You 16 Jack-up Drilling Platform, the first 400-feet jack-up drilling platform built in China and also the most advanced involving the largest investment in China’s oil industry so far.  

Apart from the above, COSCO-Shipyard, another well-known shipbuilder in China has also received offshore engineering orders that worth US$ 2.143 billion, accounting for 40% of China’s domestic market. It indicates that COSCO-Shipyard is taking an increasingly advantageous lead in China’s offshore engineering industry. According to Mr. Wang Yuhang, General Manager of COSCO-Shipyard, the company’s next step is to enlarge its share in overseas markets and at the same time actively promote sales of its offshore engineering products to the major petroleum producers in China in a bid to have a larger share of the domestic offshore engineering market.   

It is obvious that Chinese shipbuilders are assuming a more and more important part in the global offshore oil and gas engineering market, and they are urgently in of high-end international platforms to communicate with foreign counterparts and to display their technologies and products. According to statistics, CIOTC 2011 attracted nearly 10,000 industry visitors and buyers from 25 major oil producing countries and regions and was supported and participated by many well-known enterprises from home and abroad including Shell, Total, CNPC, CNOOC, CSSC, CSIC, COSCO-Shipyard, CIMC Raffles, Zhenhua Port Machinery, etc. The upcoming CIOTC 2012 will be held in November this year, which is expected to be another grand event that will facilitate the communication and development of enterprises in the industry!