Exceed Expands to New Markets (UK)

Deepwater drilling and performance improvement specialist Exceed is exhibiting at Offshore Europe (stand 3D210) and announcing significant growth along with international expansion into new markets.

The Aberdeen-based company has established new companies in Canada and Ghana on the back of recent contract wins and is in the process of setting up entities in Angola and the Middle East. Exceed has also secured further performance improvement work with Talisman Sinopec locally in the North Sea following a successful earlier project.

Exceed established an impressive track record as a performance improvement specialist before diversifying to launch the industry’s first project management team to focus solely on drilling projects in deepwater. The last 12 months have involved growth and diversification of both the performance improvement and deepwater divisions of the company in response to international client demand.

The establishment of Exceed Canada followed an agreement with two Canadian operators to provide high-calibre wells teams to support their existing drilling programmes. Despite significant challenges, the Canadian entity was established within a two-month timeframe and Exceed now has a team of close to 20 supporting operations offshore East Coast Canada.

The investment in a new enterprise in Ghana is driven by a high degree of confidence in the growth of the region following the announcement of the TEN deepwater field development offshore Ghana and other emerging opportunities in the Gulf of Guinea. With an initial investment of circa USD $100,000, Ghana is a strategic decision for Exceed while offering a business-friendly operating environment.

Whilst establishing an international footprint, Exceed’s Performance Improvement division has also branched out into new arenas. Work secured recently by the division includes the Talisman Sinopec project on a North Sea platform and supporting a world first deepwater rigless well stimulation campaign for a Ghana-based client. The company has also been awarded land-based projects with a multi-rig contract win in the Middle East.

Exceed founder and director Ian Mills, who has 30 years’ experience in the oil & gas industry including senior drilling roles at Shell and BP, said: “We have experienced an increase in client-led enquiries across the business, particularly for performance improvement where we have a differentiated service with our iVISION offering, the quality of our coaches and our ability to provide rig performance measurement. As a result of the increased number of projects, we have invested heavily in our recruitment, training and selection and now run monthly in-house training programmes for new coaches. We expect our PI division will increase turnover from just over $2million to $8million, while overall turnover is expected to be around $20million.

“The next year will see us building on our international footprint by establishing an operation in Angola and the Middle East, while strengthening our presence in Canada and Ghana and looking at further prospects in Australia, Myanmar and Vietnam. We are all excited by the work we are going to be doing in the Middle East. The fact that we have been requested to support a land-based project, which is typically much lower cost and therefore lower ROI, speaks to our reputation and the confidence in our approach.’’

Exceed’s stand at Offshore Europe will provide an opportunity for clients to see a live demo of iVISION, Exceed’s visual knowledge management platform which is currently being client-tested and will be fully operational and available to performance improvement clients later this year. Exceed’s Brazil-based partners Genesis will be present at the stand to demo their Rig Performance System, which is available to Exceed clients through the partnership.

Exceed launched its deepwater division following increased activity and well complexity, with the aim to become the world’s premier deepwater wells specialists who develop deepwater prospects without incidents and at the lowest possible cost of access. The key benefits to Exceed’s client – NOCs and IOCs – include the quality of its people and its track record for delivering results, safely, on time, and within budget.

The Performance Improvement division has a track record of helping clients save millions of pounds by improving rig productive time and safety offshore. Typically, an increase of 10-15% in productive time can be achieved through continuously improving the performance of the team.

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Press Release, September 02, 2013