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INTERVIEW SUBSEA SURVEY

Trond, sister-publication Marine Technology

Reporter (MTR) featured you about a year ago in its March-April edition. What's new for

Argeo since?

It's been a lot, I can tell you. It seems like the last time I spoke with MTR, it was two, three years ago now—that's how much has happened. But at the same time, we’re still fnding our feet. A year ago, we had just acquired Argeo

Searcher, which was one of our frst subsea survey vessels and had started our frst ultra-deep-water projects. And since then, we've added so much more. The Searcher has completed several hallmark projects for prominent cus- tomers like the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate, Shell in Nigeria and the National Centre for Polar and Ocean

Research (NCPOR) in the Indian Ocean.

We’ve rolled out our newest AUV line with Hugin Su- periors and bought our newest subsea vessel, the Venture, from Shearwater while also bringing them in as a share- holder. The Venture was used by TotalEnergies for their

Namibia development project Venus and is mobilized there, as we speak. We’ve also commercialized and proven the Argeo LISTEN system for subsea integrity inspections and proven its capability as a deep-sea mineral detection and resource estimation tool. Lastly, the Searcher is active in the Calypso feld in Trinidad and Tobago as part of a contract with Woodside Energy.

If someone had told me one year ago that what we would be doing now, I wouldn’t have believed it. I’d think it would be impossible, but there’s been fantastic team- work and spirit throughout the company, which has obvi- ously grown. We have now 80 employees, both onshore and offshore, and that continues to grow as we develop You’ve had great successes this far? How will more projects and technological advancements. you maintain this drive and uniqueness for years to come?

Out of all those projects you mentioned, is

First, we aren’t a company that stands still. We always there one that was either your favorite or one move on. We have a portfolio of intellectual property that that challenged Argeo? goes in sync with our technology development in three

That's the thing—they almost all are because a lot of what verticals—oil and gas, marine minerals, and renewables. we are doing comes from teamwork. And of course, when We harness this in new sensors that can open new fron- you're moving into this, you’re apprehensive. Will it work tiers in terms of exploration—either in deeper water or as we have tested? Will it give the results that we hoped it in previously mentioned projects like offshore wind. This would? With NCPOR, we’re trying to prove that these sen- combination of technology as a service to deliver superior sors can be used for identifying mineral resources at nearly products is really what we're about.

6,000 meters, which is basically unheard of. We’ve spent a lot

When we started all of this, we knew that we could of time developing the sensor system and when something choose to be one of the best. That's always a strategy, but works, it’s a special moment for everyone involved, from the we chose to be unique in what we do and to bring some- technology developers to the operators and so forth. thing new to the feld, which is somewhat of a heritage

MAy/june 2024 OFFSHORE ENGINEER 27