Plexus Recognized at Northern Star Business Awards 2014

Plexus Holdings PLC has on 25 September 2014 accepted the ‘Commitment to Innovative Use of Research and Development’ award at the 11^th annual Northern Star Business Awards 2014, the flagship event for the Aberdeen & Grampian Chamber of Commerce. 

The Award recognises Plexus’ long standing commitment to research and development (‘R&D’) which underpins the growing success of Plexus’ proprietary friction grip method of engineering called POS-GRIP®. Plexus was also nominated as a finalist in the Outstanding Contribution to the Energy Sector category in recognition of its proprietary POS-GRIP® technology.

The Company continues to work on a number of on-going R&D projects, most notably a Joint Industry Project (‘JIP’) to develop and commercialise a new and safer subsea wellhead, utilising its patented POS-GRIP technology.  Supported by a number of major oil and gas operators –  BG, ENI, Maersk, Shell, Total, Tullow, and Wintershall, the JIP is focussed on developing a new subsea wellhead, HGSS, to address key technical issues and requirements highlighted by regulators following the Gulf of Mexico incident in April 2010.

CEO Ben van Bilderbeek said, “This latest award, which follows the ‘Best Oil and Gas Plc’ award at the 2013 annual Stock Market Wire Awards and the ‘Entrepreneur of the Year 2013′ award at the annual Grant Thornton Quoted Company Awards, recognises Plexus’ significant and ongoing commitment to investing in R&D.  As a result of which, we have developed best-in-class surface wellhead equipment based on our proprietary POS-GRIP® technology and in turn become the dominant supplier of wellhead equipment for the HP/HT jack-up exploration market in the North Sea. We continue to invest in R&D as we look to apply our POS-GRIP technology to solve widely-acknowledged challenges in the HP/HT space.  To date we have invested £3m to develop a new and safer subsea wellhead, utilising Plexus’ patented POS-GRIP technology.  Thanks to this investment, having now finalised the design in conjunction with our industry partners we will soon be building a prototype, and remain on track for first time installation in 2015.

“At the ceremony, Sir Ian Wood, author of the recently published ‘UKCS Maximising Recovery Review: Final Report’ received a lifetime achievement award for successfully building one of the UK’s largest oil supply chain companies.   I sincerely hope that the excellent report encourages more investment in the UKCS, and believe that Plexus is ideally placed to capitalise on a resurgence in North Sea exploration activity. I also hope that the settling of the devolution question will now also bring additional interest in and support for exploration in the Scottish North Sea region. Finally, we could not have won this award without the dedication and hard work of the Company’s management, fellow employees and stakeholders all of whom have played a vital role in building Plexus to where it is today and which lays such firm foundations for a very exciting future.” 

Press Release, September 30, 2014