Borr Drilling has signed an agreement to acquire nine jackup rigs from Sembcorp Marine subsidiary PPL Shipyard, taking its fleet to 26 jackups, once all rigs under construction have been delivered.
The acquired rigs have been built or are under construction at PPL's yard in Singapore. Seven out of the nine rigs have drilling packages from Cameron (a Schlumberger company) while all nine rigs have Cameron BOPs.
The deal is expected to be worth about US$1.3 billion. Drilling will take delivery of the first of the rigs in Q4 2017, with the remaining rigs being delivered quarterly thereafter until the last rig is delivered in Q1 2019.
Borr Drilling has agreed to pay a pre-delivery installment of about $500 million in the short-term while the remaining purchase price is payable on delivery of each individual rig, which is fully financed by the delivery financing.
Borr Drilling is a newcomer to the industry but has significant ties to top management at London-headquartered Seadrill. Borr's CEO Rune Magnus Lundetrae previously served as Seadrill's CFO from 2012-2015. Borr's COO Svend Anton Maier worked at Seadrill from 2007-2016, before that he was at Transocean and Ross Offshore. Seadrill's former president and CEO Fredrik Halvorsen sits on Borr Drilling's Board of Directors, as well as Tor Olav Trøim, Seadrill's former vice president and board member from 2004-2014.
