Energy voice30 Mar 2019 18:27
Parkmead Group boss Tom Cross said yesterday the Aberdeen-based oil firm would “take its own path” to growth as North Sea newcomers battle over assets.
Mr Cross, Parkmead’s executive chairman, said the company still had an “appetite” for acquisitions and was “looking carefully” at a number of opportunities.
UK portfolios owned by a number of international oil companies, including Chevron and ConocoPhillips, were put up for sale last year.
Parkmead vows to ‘take its own path’ to growth
Brent prices have since picked up, and Mr Cross believes confidence in the North Sea’s future is high among oilfield operators and investors.
Speaking after Parkmead published its half-year results, Mr Cross said a strong financial performance meant the firm was “well positioned” for growth.
But Parkmead will not compete against private-equity-backed newcomers for larger packages of North Sea assets, he said.
Parkmead has completed a number of deals in recent years. It snapped up additional stakes in the Perth and Dolphin fields in February last year, giving it 100% ownership.
The two fields form the bedrock of the firm’s flagship Greater Perth Area (GPA) project in the central North Sea.
London-listed Parkmead has also scooped up acreage in UK offshore licensing auctions, securing nine new blocks in last year’s 30th round.
Mr Cross said: “Our team is very experienced. We have worked in the North Sea our entire careers.
“We’re a long-term resident and we build in areas we know and understand. We are not competing with newcomers. We will take our own path.
“In licensing rounds, we are very successful because we know what we want and are very focused. We have a track record of winning the things we want.”
He said he did not expect Brexit to have implications for Parkmead, which produces from onshore wells in the Netherlands.
OPTIONS OPEN ON GPA
Mr Cross is keeping Parkmead’s options open for developing the GPA.
The company is holding commercial talks with a view to tying GPA back to the Scott site, operated by CNOOC International.
The Scott platform is only about six miles away from GPA.
London-listed Parkmead is also in discussions with a number of major oilfield service companies about the GPA project.
While using existing infrastructure would help keep costs down, the possibility of bringing in a floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel has not been ruled out.
Mr Cross said it was possible to get “some good deals on FPSOs” in the current market.
He added: “The advantage of an FPSO is that you can move it. If you’ve drained one field you can move the vessel onto another one.”
Parkmead hopes to recover 193 million barrels of oil from GPA.
Meanwhile, “considerable progress” is being made at the Platypus development in the so
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