SapuraKencana seeks US$6b in work

SapuraKencana Petroleum Bhd, Malaysia's biggest oil and gas services
company, is bidding for US$6 billion of new contracts in countries
mainly outside Southeast Asia as it seeks to double its order book.

The
Selangor, Malaysia-based company, with existing orders of US$6 billion,
sees growth in South America, East and West Africa, and India, chief
executive officer Datuk Seri Shahril Shamsuddin said today in an
interview in Singapore. About 40 per cent of the contracts it's bidding
for are in Brazil, while another 30 per cent are for work in India and
Africa, he said.

SapuraKencana won shareholder approval
yesterday for its US$2.9 billion purchase of the tender-rig operations
of Seadrill Ltd. The deal will make it the world's largest operator of
tender rigs with 51 per cent of market share. Shahril is overseeing the
acquisition about 10 months after SapuraKencana was formed by the
RM11.9 billion merger of two Malaysian oil and gas companies.

"Moving
ahead, the major acquisitions have already been made," Shahril said in
an interview with Rishaad Salamat on Bloomberg Television's 'On the
Move Asia'. "The main objective now is to consolidate."

The
stock fell one per cent to RM3.05 in Kuala Lumpur trading at 11.24am
local time. It's advanced 45 per cent since it began trading May 17,
compared with the 10 per cent rise in Malaysia's benchmark FTSE Bursa
Malaysia KLCI Index.

Tender rigs are barges that carry drilling
equipment to oil platforms at sea which can be removed when work is
completed, Shahril said. This gives SapuraKencana the option of
flexible vessels that can move from one site to another without the
need for a permanently installed drilling package, he said.

Investors
approved the Seadrill deal including the placement of 587 million new
SapuraKencana shares at RM2.80 apiece, the Malaysian company said in a
statement yesterday. SapuraKencana gains 13 tender rigs as part of the
acquisition, in addition to the five rigs it owns with Seadrill under a
joint venture, Shahril said. After the transaction it will operate 21
tender rigs, including five under construction.

SapuraKencana
was created last year following the merger between SapuraCrest
Petroleum Bhd and Kencana Petroleum Bhd. The chairman of the latter is
Datuk Mokhzani Mahathir, the son of former Malaysian Prime Minister Tun
Dr Mahathir Mohamad.-- Bloomberg