Dubai: Drydocks World announced on Monday that it will build the largest ever rig for the North Sea in a deal worth an estimated $730 million (Dh2.7 billion), boosting the UAE’s ambition to be a high-end industrial manufacturer.
It follows other announcements attracting high-end industrial manufacturing to the UAE, including agreements between the Abu Dhabi government-owned Mubadala and the likes of Boeing, Rolls-Royce and GE.
Khamis Juma Bu Amim, chairman of Drydocks World, signed the deal with Drill One Capital to engineer, procure and construct a CJ-80 jack-up rig for the North Sea, based on a design by offshore engineering firm Gusto MCS.
Bu Amim said that discussions with project engineers for the ‘Dubai Expo 2020 NS’ rig could start early. It is scheduled to be delivered by 2017.
Milestone achievement
The contract was hailed as a demonstration of the country’s potential to be a global leader in high-end technology processes.
“[This] project is a milestone where I expect the company to be in the coming years. This is not a small project. It is a mega project,” Bu Amim said at Tuesday press conference announcing the deal.
The latest energy-related project follows five others developed by Drydocks World in Germany, US, UK and Australia.
“We are reaching the milestone that we believe is rightfully ours,” Bu Amim said.
Payments to be made on schedule
Drydocks World, whose international assets have come under scrutiny in recent years for late payments, is expecting its business portfolio to sign $1.4 billion in projects by the third quarter of this year.
Bu Amim said Drydocks World will make all scheduled payments to creditors on time in 2014 but stopped short of promising any prospect of advanced payments on its liabilities.
Drydocks World is currently undergoing a restructuring process as it bounces back from the global financial crisis. Bu Amim said the company turned over $100 to $110 million EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) last year and expects earnings to increase with the company’s global profile.
