Bahrain-based ship and rig-repair yard Asry is making a push into Saudi Arabia's land-based rig repair market, the company's top official has said.

"Saudi Arabia has around 100 onshore drilling rigs in place and there is a rising demand for services in the upstream market," chief executive Nils Kristian Berge told the Gulf Daily News (GDN), our sister publication.

He was speaking on the sidelines of the company's annual media ghabga at the Gulf Hotel.

"With established revenue streams continuing to grow, Asry also saw new streams come online last year," he said.

"The consultancy division, which was founded at the beginning of last year with a view to providing independent engineering and design expertise to mitigate maritime risk, saw business levels in its first year of operations almost double the expected target," he added.

According to him, the move to establish Asry Consultancy Services paid greater dividends than expected largely due to a proactive approach in which work was generated by the division approaching clients directly, and through existing repair scopes.

"This detachment of Asry's engineering expertise, to be monetised independently, is a move that is set to grow in the coming years," Berge said.

"While new projects are being completed to expand the yard's capabilities, the core repair business continued to make history with two major milestones occurring last year.

"First was the repair of Asry's 4,000th ship.

"This tally now ranks us as one of the most experienced shipyards in the Middle East, having been in operation since 1977, longer than any yard in the Arabian Gulf.

"The 4,000th vessel, the Gas Al Gurain, was an LPG tanker owned by Kuwait Oil Tanker Company (KOTC)," he said.

The second milestone, he said, was Asry repairing its 50th rig, the Perro Negro 5, an independent leg cantilever jack-up rig owned by Saipem and operated by Saudi Aramco.

"The size and scale of the rig is indicative of the evolution of Asry's rig capabilities and expertise over the five years since the division was launched," he said.

"In that time, the yard had repaired one of the largest rigs in the world. Last year, it posted offshore repair work revenues that were approximately 42 per cent of total revenues, making it now an essential part of the business," Berge added. – TradeArabia News Service