Page 46: of Offshore Engineer Magazine (Sep/Oct 2022)

45 47

INTERVIEW CARL TROWELL, CEO, ACTEON GROUP gas infrastructure, renewables or other structures. It means tion in the supply chain, risk in the supply chain of equip- for all of our services, it’s a move or a nudge over in that di- ment, key components, materials being ready is a challenge.

rection, or it’s a repurposing or dual-use of some solutions. The other consequence though, which is somewhat in

I can give you an example of that in what we have with- the opposite direction, is that it’s brought a real focus to in our moorings and anchors business unit, InterMoor. energy security. It’s brought a revised view to supply and

There, we developed a SEPLA anchor, a suction embedded investment in oil and gas, and particularly gas, trigger- plate anchor which was used in the oil and gas industry in ing (for us) a bit of a resurgence in that market. And you many places all around the world for certain anchoring mentioned the downturn 2014 to 2021 or so. I think dur- purposes. It turns out, it’s incredibly applicable to foating ing that time there were people who thought that a dollar wind. So we’ve slightly re-engineered it, we’ve looked at a would never be spent in oil and gas ever again. That’s un- deployment technique, and we have a product which is der revision at the moment.

equally applicable in both spaces. You almost have a perfect storm at the moment, where

Then 2H, our engineering group, specializes in risers most offshore oil and gas sectors are picking up and seeing a and umbilicals. In the energy transition they’ve been suc- new surge of investment, while at the same time, the renew- cessful taking that expertise and applying it decarboniza- ables market is coming up and at the same time people are tion of the oil and gas industry. working on things like nearshore defenses and coastal struc-

So they’re taking that expertise, reversing it and coming tures. They’re all happening at the same time and that just up with engineered solutions to, for example, do cold-wa- adds another layer of back pressure into the supply chain.

ter cooling on FPSOs, reducing the energy requirements

Acteon Group has built and acquired a because (by using seawater for the cooling). They’re doing family of brands across the marine and something similar to provide air conditioning into airports the energy industries. What’s next?

and hospitals by using deep water.

Overall, there are a lot that companies and individuals that For us, we have a new structure, working with three divi- grew up engineering in the oil and gas business (now able to sions now on a global scale. That’s been the latest evolution, address the challenges associated with the energy transition.) and we see the benefts of further integration both from tech- nology synergies and probably new product development, from bringing those companies closer together. But I think

The attitudes have changed quickly and there is a mega cycle coming of investment and where that

I think that’s driven a lot by following lies between offshore wind and oil and gas, we’ll have to see. the money.

I think there’s something that everyone has to think I think there’s room for further consolidation amongst the about, which is there’s going to be more infrastructure go- supply chain. But on the back of the last oil and gas down- ing into the sea in the next decade from offshore wind than turn, we have a lot of smaller subscale oil feld services busi- went in throughout the whole lifetime of oil and gas. If you ness and I think there’s going to be some consolidation there.

just look at the number of units, the number of installa- With respect to the renewables, you’ve got this huge tions, when you start moving to foating wind, it’s going to investment cycle coming. We did a recent piece of work be off the scale of the number of moorings. If you’re in this and we found out that on a typical offshore wind project, sector you should be turning your eyes to this because we’re you’ve got almost 10 times as many companies indepen- at the beginning of what will be a mega cycle of investment. dently contracted in the supply chain than you do in an equivalent oil and gas project. So we think logic would tell you that there’s a need there from an effciency and

How has the war in Ukraine and continued delivery point of view for consolidation. And there’s also supply chain snarls materially impacted the room for there to be big global offshore service compa-

Acteon Group and what measures have nies focused on the offshore wind developed because we’re been enacted to help mitigate that risk?

It’s had limited direct infuence on us in the sense that only at the beginning of this evolution. So you could see we don’t and haven’t historically had very many operations the need for bigger companies to service the industry on a around that part of the world or with Russia. But, of course, global scale developing. And we see ourselves as a platform a lot of the knock-on effects are having big implications. for future M&A, be that bolt in to our structure or if we

On the negative side, I think the biggest thing is cost infa- take part in some of the bigger combination.

46 OFFSHORE ENGINEER OEDIGITAL.COM