Singapore's PACC Offshore Services Holdings Pte. Ltd. (POSH), Asia’s largest operator of offshore supply vessels, announced yesterday that Mexican conglomerate Grupo Pegaso has signed an agreement for vessels with POSH joint ventures in Mexico.
Details of the OSV charter arrangements with Grupo Pegaso have not yet been released, but this appears to be a positive recovery step for POSH.
In 2011, POSH set up a joint venture, Servicios Martimos Gosh SA, with POSH holding a 50% stake and Oceanografia SA (OSA) chief executive Amado Yanez the other 50%.
GOSH supplied eight platform supply vessels to GOSH, along with a US$142.8million loan to finance their purchase. The PSVs were, in turn, chartered by OSA to PEMEX in 2013.
Last year, OSA took on about $160million in debt to buy vessels before regulations changed in the Mexican oil sector. OSA used the Caballo Marango offshore support vessel and the heavy-lift OSA Goliath as security. OSA has a fleet of 69 offshore work vessels.
Since 28 February 2014, the administration of OSA has been under the control of the Mexican administrator in connection with the Mexican government’s investigations of OSA over alleged fraud arising from billings charged by OSA to PEMEX.
On 21 May 2014, POSH announced that it had been informed PEMEX would stop paying charter hire on vessels chartered from OSA to all trusts, including the GOSH Trust, and would instead make payments directly to SAE. GOSH, through its trustee, filed an injunction in the Mexican courts to nullify the order, and stopped work on the vessels chartered to OSA.
In late May, Lee Mee Kium, POSH’s general manager of risk and investor relations, said POSH expected to regain full control of GOSH and its ships, and would seek new local partners in Mexico.
POSH controls a fleet of more than 120 offshore support vessels that includes the state-of-the-art 16,000 brake horsepower (BHP) dynamic positioning anchor handling and supply vessels, all classed by ABS.
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