The Oil and Gas Industry Remains Vital: Mermaid Maritime’s Chief Operating Officer

Even as the world shifts towards renewable energy, there will be many opportunities in the oil and gas industry in the coming decades, says Mermaid Maritime’s Chief Operating Officer and Executive Director Paul Whiley. The firm, headquartered in Thailand and listed on the Singapore Exchange, offers offshore and subsea services to companies in the sector and has contracts across the globe. 

In recent years, Mermaid Maritime has transitioned to other, more profitable evergreen and sunrise specialties to boost its bottom line and longevity. “For example, we’ve always done subsea cable laying, but didn’t concentrate on this and so never got a good share in the market. This is one of our new business priorities,” he elaborates.  

“We’ve also been involved in decommissioning – removing various infrastructure for disposal, reuse or recycling at the end of an oil or gas field’s economic life – but not to the extent that we’ve planned for the future. We’ve very excited about delving deeper into this work because there’s at least 50 years’ worth of business ahead in this area, and it’s eco-friendly.”

He explains that there are vast numbers of offshore oil and gas wells worldwide, and oil and gas majors and governments have increasingly committed to returning marine environments to their original status once harvests from the wells are completed. “This means that we will see more demand for decommissioning-related services.”

Mermaid has already broken into the surging United Kingdom market for such work. Since 2023, it has inked two three-year contracts, with international oil and gas firms such as Shell, to implement decommissioning projects in the region. 

All told, Mermaid has secured offshore contracts in Thailand, the Middle East, United Kingdom and Western Sub Sahara, with a total value of US$735 million as of 31 March 2024, for cable laying, subsea pipeline tie-ins, inspection, repair and maintenance, transportation and installation, decommissioning and related work. These projects are scheduled to be performed and realised from FY2024 – FY2026. 

Meeting the moment in business

Whiley shares that Mermaid’s success to date has come from keeping an eye out for potential opportunities and seizing them at the right time. For instance, as countries and the oil and gas industry were starting to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic in late 2021, it spent US$16 million to buy a 50 per cent ownership stake in a crucial offshore construction vessel.

“We had about US$53 million in the bank, so it was a big investment, but we took control of our position in the cable space through that purchase. The Millennium 3 vessel's unique design and capabilities earned it unprecedented approval from all the big majors in the Middle East to lay cable in waters shallower than 10 metres, using dynamic positioning, and eliminating the need for anchoring. This has meant much quicker, safer and more seamless project rollouts for the Group and our clients, which in turn has organically driven a significant uptick in capacity, whilst simultaneously rewarding our shareholders with solid upside. Moreover, for the longer term, the cable space makes up a considerable part of the new green revolution [in wind] – which is obviously always a driver.”

It also capitalised on the United Kingdom’s regulation changes, introduced in 2022 to stop oil and gas firms from opting to pay fines instead of fulfilling their more costly decommissioning responsibilities, to make its inroads into the region’s decommissioning market. “We knew we had a small window to make our name known there quickly,” Whiley says. 

“We made a play there and got the first job after the rule change. Even though we incurred an initial loss on that project, it was worth it. We made a space for ourselves in the market and have developed it from there, which led to our two, more recent contracts with Canadian Natural Resources and Shell.”

Whiley adds that such close attention to industry developments and openings must be paired with a willingness to put in hard work. Before he left Mermaid in 2016 for family reasons and rejoined it as its chief operating officer in 2020, he co-founded its existing business unit in the Middle East and spent years building it to its current leading position there. 

“If you want to stay on top and maintain critical momentum, then you really need to try to make the company vital.”

The Mermaid military ethos 

Over the years, he has also inculcated his dedication to planning – honed during his service in the South African military, when he became the most decorated navy diver in its history, with a Gold Cross of Honour conferred by the government – throughout Mermaid. “Any project is like a military operation, in that you have a much better chance of succeeding with planning.”

“We try to instil this ethos, to look at every project as a little military operation and run it like that.” He highlights that this has fostered more independent, proactive project managers who are up to the task of driving the company forward. “It’s a sign of sustainable management practices when the project division can run its operations autonomously and without executive involvement or guidance.”

“At the same time, we step up to help one another when necessary, and have one another’s interests at heart.” Underlining Mermaid’s supportive culture, it has many long-tenured staff among its workforce of more than 1,000 engineers, divers, technicians, surveyors and others –  including Whiley’s former fellow soldiers in his military unit. 

“Many of them came to work in Mermaid, and most remain with us to this day. In fact, they work so hard that I find myself constantly having to “force” them to make time for themselves – go to the gym, collect stamps, or do whatever else they enjoy outside of working for our great company – this is the kind of passion that they and many others in our firm have, and I am convinced that is what keeps us successful.”

Whiley notes that Mermaid is in a strong position moving forward. With its business segments growing across the board in 2023, it increased its revenue by 23 per cent, to US$275.4 million, and recorded a net profit of US$9.7 million, a sharp increase from its US$338,000 net profit in 2022. Its share price hit 14.7 cents in April 2024, the highest since pre Covid-19. 

Whiley also attributes the success of Mermaid to the support of its shareholder Thoresen Thai Agencies PCL (TTA), which owns a 58.2% stake in the company. “In concert with our biggest shareholder’s direction and best intentions, we are moving into sunrise space.”

“Four years ago, we were an US$80 million company. I don’t think anybody at the time would have believed it if I said we would be doing nearly half a billion dollars’ worth of business from 2023 to 2025. Yet that’s where we are now, and we will continue to improve the delivery of our services, and expand and claim our space in the market.”

About Mermaid Maritime PCL

Mermaid is a leading international subsea and offshore drilling services company for major oil and gas companies or their contractors, with its corporate headquarters based in Thailand. With operational bases in South East Asia, the Middle East and the North Sea, the Group’s main operating business is its offshore services segment.

Mermaid provides full turnkey services to oil and gas majors operating offshore through its diversified portfolio of subsea vessels, specialised diving equipment and remotely operated vehicles. The Group has been in the offshore business for over three decades,  and boasts a team of more than 500 professional divers, technicians, surveyors, management and support staff. 

Mermaid, in which Thoresen Thai Agencies PCL (TTA) holds a 58.22% stake, commenced its operations in 1983. The Group was partially acquired by TTA in 1995 and was successfully listed on Singapore Exchange (SGX) on 16 October 2007.

For more information, please visit: https://www.mermaid-group.com/home

About kopi-C: the Company brew

kopi-C is a regular column by SGX Research in collaboration with Beansprout that features C-level executives of leading companies listed on SGX. These interviews are profiles of senior management aimed at helping investors better understand the individuals who run these corporations.

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