Samsung Heavy Industries charters drillship to Italy’s Saipem

South Korea’s Samsung Heavy Industries Co. has signed a contract to lease a newbuild drillship to Italian oilfield services company Saipem S.p.A. for nearly two years.

The ship, named Samsung Santorini, will be delivered in November 2021 for use until August 2023, Samsung Heavy said on Tuesday.

The contract includes an option for Saipem to buy the ship, depending on demand trends, it said.

Samsung did not reveal the value of the deal, but it usually costs at least $500 million to build a drillship.

The ship is one of the two drillships first ordered by Ocean Rig, a drilling firm that Transocean acquired in 2018. Transocean canceled the orders with Samsung in September 2019 as global oil prices fell.

According to the oil industry, the breakeven point for a drillship operator is $60 per barrel.

Excluding the leased drillship, Samsung Heavy still has four drillships in stock as buyers canceled their orders citing a slide in oil prices. The value of the five ships was estimated at a combined $2.99 billion, according to industry officials.

“With rising oil prices amid expectations of a global economic recovery, we’re receiving queries from energy companies about the construction of drillships,” said a Samsung Heavy official.

Write to Kyung-Min Kang at Kkm1026@hankyung.com
In-Soo Nam edited this article.