Seadrill-Sonangol JV secures nine-well contract in Angola

Sonadrill, Seadrill’s 50:50 joint venture with an affiliate of Sonangol, has secured a nine-well contract with six options, each for one well, in Angola for the newbuild Libongos drillship.

Seadrill said on Wednesday that the estimated total contract value is $101 million. It is expected to start in late 3Q 2019 and run to early 2021.

According to information on Bassoe Offshore, the drillship’s dayrate is $204,000 for the duration of 495 days. The contract starts on September 23, 2019, and ends on January 30, 2021.

The Libongos is the first of two Sonangol-owned drillships to be bareboat chartered into Sonadrill along with two Seadrill-owned or managed units.

Seadrill entered into the joint venture with Sonangol in February 2019. It was agreed for Seadrill to operate four drillships on behalf of Sonadrill, focusing on opportunities in Angolan waters.

It was also agreed that each of the JV parties would bareboat two drillships into Sonadrill.

The Seadrill drillships are from its existing owned or managed fleet. The Sonangol drillships, Libongos and Quenguela, both 7th generation high-spec ultra-deepwater drillships, were built at a DSME shipyard in Korea and delivered in the first half of 2019.

The first drillship, Sonangol Libongos, was delivered in March 2019. The naming ceremony for the second drillship, Sonangol Quengela, was held at DSME’s yard in May 2019 and the vessel left the shipyard in June.