BUSINESS BRIEFS

Xodus Group has appointedSteve Jewell as subsurface director.

McMoRan Exploration Co. has appointedA. Peyton Bush III and William P. Carmichael to its board of directors. Bush is president and CEO of Hibernia Homestead Banccorp. Carmichael is a retired executive with more than 35 years of experience in finance.

Devon Energy has appointedJohn Richels as CEO. He will remain the company’s president.

Ulstein Design & Solutions has appointedFrode Sollid as design manager for offshore support vessels. 

Origin Energy Ltd. has appointedHelen Hardy as company secretary. She succeeds Bill Hundy.

Signal International has appointedCarl F. Wegener as VP of strategic planning, and Joe Mayhall as director of sales and marketing for the company’s signal ship repair division.

Hydratight has appointedPaul Hughes as connectors product manager, and Juergen Schimohr as account manager. Hughes will be responsible for the company’s Morgrip mechanical pipe connectors. Schimohr will be responsible for promoting the wind products.

Lincoln Electric has appointedPeter Pletcher as director of global consumable development, and Ferry Naber as director of global machine development. Both are new positions in the marketing and product development organization.

ASCO Group has appointedJohn Jordan as CEO of its operations in the Americas. He will be responsible for the company’s North and South American logistics operations, and its international freight forwarding business.

INTECSEA has appointedDr. Mike Paulin as operations director of Canada.

FMC Technologies has appointedJohan F. Pfeiffer as VP of global surface wellhead, effective June 1.

Arne Austreid has resigned as president and CEO of Prosafe.

Fenstermaker has appointedSteve Leblanc as pipeline market leader.

ExxonMobil has elected PeterBrabeck-Letmathe and Jay S. Fishman to its board of directors. Brabeck-Letmathe is chairman of Nestlé S.A. Fishman is chairman and CEO of The Travelers Companies Inc.

Senergy has appointedMike Bowyer as its first COO.

Husky Energy has namedAsim Ghosh president and CEO effective June 1.

InterAct has appointedBryant Morris as general manager for the Gulf Coast region and Megan Hayes as business development manager.

CNOOC Ltd. has namedLi Fanrong non-executive director.

Hess Corp. has appointedRobert Biglin as VP and treasurer effective Sept. 1.

Paradigm has appointedJames Lamb as executive VP of sales operations.

Ron Boyd moves from business line manager for rock drilling tools at Atlas Copco to project manager for its oil and gas products. Gene Mattila becomes business line manager for rock drilling tools.

RMSpumptools has recruitedDoug Harwell as VP of western hemisphere operations. Asia Pacific manager Eddie Moore has been promoted to VP of eastern hemisphere operations.

UTEC Survey has appointedSteve Williamson as CFO. He was previously VP of finance for Helix Energy Solutions.

ACE Winches has appointedDerek Penny as head of group sales and business development.

Marine Subsea has appointedTony McKay as new projects manager for marine projects.

As of July 1 at Beach Energy Ltd.,Neil Gibbins will be COO, Steve Masters will be chief commercial officer, and Gordon Moseby will be general manager. Hector Gordon, currently Beach CEO, will continue as an executive director of Beach and acting managing director of Sopmerton Energy Ltd.

Expro has promotedChris Mawtus to COO. He will be responsible for the group’s operations in North America, the Middle East and North Africa, Asia, Europe CIS, Latin America, and southern and West Africa.

NACE International has namedChris Fowler, global director - corrosion at Exova, president of the association for corrosion.

Offshore cargo transportation group Swire Oilfield Services has namedRupert Bray as COO. Bray was director and general manager of the company’s UK division.

Offshore engineering consultancy CSL has namedNeil Knowles as managing director in succession to Mark Gillespie, who left the company in January.

Cosalt has promotedCarine De Weirdt to product sales manager to look after its Single Point Mooring (SPM) and offshore rope business. In her new role she will focus on servicing accounts in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, while developing Cosalt’s expanding product range in partnership with wire rope manufacturer Bridon.

Samson has promotedKris Volpenhein to Asia technical sales manager.

DOF Subsea Asia Pacific has appointedMike Apathy to head its new business unit in Darwin, Australia.

Jerry Howard, senior VP of corporate affairs for Marathon Oil Corp. plans to retire effective June 1, after 35 years with the company.

Peritus International has appointedThyl Kint as global director of Floating Systems and Asia-Pacific field developments.

Clough Ltd. has appointedRoger Rees as deputy chairman.

Seadrill Ltd. has namedEsa Ikaheimonen as CFO and senior VP of Seadrill Management AS.

HB Rentals has namedTim Murphy as technical sales and marketing manager.

Company News

EMS Energy Ltd.’s subsidiaryOilfield Services & Supplies Pte Ltd. and Tianhe Oil Group Co. Ltd. have established Tianhe Oil (Singapore) Pte Ltd., a Singapore incorporated joint venture. The JV will trade in Tianhe Oil Group’s drilling and tools and related equipment. Oilfield Services & Supplies holds 20% interest, and Tianhe Oil Group holds 80%.

Total Marine Technologies has contracted Perry Slingsby Systems to supply a 3,000-m (9,843-ft) capable Triton XLX ROV system.

Dana Petroleum has agreed to acquire Petro Canada Netherlands for around $393 million. Canadian E&P company Suncor Energy merged with Petro Canada in 2009. The sale is in line with Suncor’s strategy to divest certain upstream offshore interests.

Statoil has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with China’s Sinochem group to promote cooperation between the companies. This follows a recent transaction under which Sinochem bought a 40% interest from Statoil in the Peregrino oil field development due to enter production early next year offshore Brazil.

AWE Ltd. registered office and principal place of business is now: Level 16, 40 Mount Street North Sydney, NSW, 2060 Tel: +612 8912 8000, Fax: +612 9460 0176, www.awexplore.com.

Ranger Offshore Inc. says it has completed acquisition of Tiburon Divers Inc.

Barclays Private Equity has taken a minority stake in the Wilton Group, a provider of project management services in the UK. Wilton has three main business units – PD&MS, Wilton Engineering Services, and Universal Coatings – together offering turnkey packages to the offshore and onshore engineering sectors.

TheDynamic Positioning Centre has celebrated its 10th anniversary.

Seadrill says it has acquired further shares in Scorpion Offshore, taking its total holding in the drilling contractor to 50.11%.

Representatives ofEni have met Kazakhstan’s president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, to review progress on hydrocarbon projects. Eni CEO, Paolo Scaroni and E&P COO, Claudio Descalzi, were in Astana, mainly to follow up on an agreement signed in Rome last November, in the presence of Nazarbayev and Italy’s Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

Clough Helix JV has contracted the Normand Clough for a well decommissioning project in the South China Sea.

Petrobras International Braspetro (PIB BV) has acquired a 100% interest in block 2 in the Raukumara basin, offshore New Zealand.

Expro says its Asia South division has achieved ISO 9001:2008 accreditation for Quality Management Systems. That ISO tag covers delivery of well testing, subsea safety systems, and wireline intervention across Indonesia and Malaysia.

Analysts atDeloitte’s welcome proposals to widen access to the UK’s offshore production infrastructure, which were announced by the UK’s new coalition government.

Baker Hughes reports acquisition of Oilpump Services, an electrical submersible pump service company in western Siberia. Baker Hughes says Russia has 60% of all global ESP systems and that this acquisition adds three full-service bases and four remote field bases to Baker’s Noyabrsk operation.

ACE Winches has established a new division in Dusavik, Norway — ACE Winches Norge — to serve Scandinavia. The new operation will provide spooling, equipment rental, vessel bollard pull testing, and showcase ACE’s product range.

PTC has established its international business development and operations headquarters in Aberdeen. The company also has offices in Stavanger, Norway, and Houston, Texas.

Chevron North Sea has awarded RBG a three-year contract worth $1.7 million. Under the contract, RBG will deliver electrical rope access services and provide electrical inspections and upgrades for the Alba, Captain, and Erskine platforms on the UK continental shelf.

BG Group has official consent from the United Republic of Tanzania to farm-in blocks 1, 3, and 4 offshore southern Tanzania. Upon completion of the agreements, BG will acquire 60% of Ophir Energy Plc’s current 100% holdings in the blocks.

Barclays Natural Resource Investments has formed Hydra Energy, an oil development company focusing on undeveloped discoveries, marginal oil fields, and late-life assets offshore Australasia.

Ensco has opened a new global headquarters in London.

Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar has issued an order to divide theMineral Management Service in three parts – Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Bureau of Safety and Environment Enforcement, and Office of Natural Resources Revenue.

Tullow Oil has found non-commercial gas while drilling the Noix de Coco prospect offshore Gabon. Noix de Coco-1, drilled in the Azobe permit 45 km (28 mi) northeast of Port Gentil, encountered wet gas within the Cretaceous interval. However, sandstones in the main objective were of poor quality at this location, so the well will be P&A’d.

Aminex says a delegation from North Korea is in London negotiating a new production-sharing agreement (PSA) covering activity in the East Korea Bay basin. Chosun Energy has become a 50% shareholder in Korex, Aminex’s subsidiary for the region, and will become increasingly involved in management of this project. Assuming agreement for the PSA can be reached with the North Korean government, work will start as soon as possible on the next phase of exploration in the area.

Iran and Brazil have signed a memorandum of understanding to cooperate on energy, including exploration and production of hydrocarbon resources. According to Iranian news service Shana, the memorandum was signed in Tehran by Iran’s Petroleum Minister Dr. Masoud Mirkazemi and Harold Lima, director of Brazil’s National Oil and Gas Agency, ANP. The two countries have agreed to set up a joint energy committee which will hold sessions every six months.

Navegantes Maritime Construction and Services, a subsidiary of Keppel Offshore & Marine, has entered into an agreement with Brazil’s TWB Group to acquire the Estaleiro TWB shipyard in Navegantes, 110 km (68.3 mi) north of Florianoplolis in Santa Catarina.

Aberdeen Harbour Board has started work on its $46 million Torry Quay redevelopment. The initial stage of the three-phase project should take 18 months to complete and will involve demolishing existing upstream berths, replacing them with 300 m (984 ft) of realigned, deepwater quays.

Halliburton and Boots & Coots have entered into a definitive merger agreement, whereby Halliburton will acquire all of the outstanding stock of Boots & Coots in a stock and cash transaction. A new product service line within Halliburton will be created to include Halliburton’s existing coiled tubing and hydraulic workover operations and Boots & Coots’ intervention services and pressure control business.

Seadrill has acquired further shares in drilling contractor Scorpion, lifting its holding in the company to 40.1%. It now plans to make a cash offer for the remaining shares.

Santos has agreed to sell its working interest in NT/P 48 (Evans Shoal) in the Bonaparte basin offshore Northern Australia to Magellan Petroleum Australia for up to $200 million.

Santos has a 40% interest in NT/P 48 and is the operator. The other participants are PETRONAS (25%), Shell (25%), and Osaka Gas (10%).