ROVOP Increases ROV Fleet
ROVOP is to immediately increase its fleet by 50% to meet ongoing customer demand following a funding boost of EUR 63 million.
Blue Water Energy (BWE) and BGF have jointly committed to the funding, which underpins ROVOP’s ambitious future growth plans including the creation of potentially up to 80 jobs. The company, which has bases in Aberdeen and Houston, employs more than 180 people in onshore and offshore roles, and operates sixteen of the world’s most advanced ROVs.
The funding has enabled the company to increase its fleet immediately to 24 ROVs with the new assets being acquired from Tidewater in Houston. Tidewater owns and operates one of the largest fleets of offshore support vessels globally. Since being co-founded in 2011 by the CEO Steven Gray, and chairman Mark Vorenkamp, ROVOP has been 100% focused on the provision of ROV services to the oil and gas, offshore wind, telecoms and power transmission industries. Along with ROVs, the company provides highly experienced operators trained at its own specialised in-house training facilities.
Mr Gray says: “The past few years have seen customers recognise the difference in our quality of service. This latest investment allows us to continue to deliver this service to more customers, especially in the US where much of the new fleet has being acquired from Tidewater. The combination of the latest ROVs with our current assets mean that we will have the highest quality ROV fleet globally. With BGF’s support, we have already established ourselves as a leading specialist in our field. The new partnership with BWE will cement this further and accelerate our ambitious growth plans to become the leading independent ROV company. We look forward to working with Graeme Sword and the team from Blue Water Energy.”
BGF first invested EUR 11.9 million in Rovop in April, 2015, and has since supported the company twice more with additional funding to grow the fleet. Mike Sibson, of BGF, says the investment represents an exciting phase in the development and growth of ROVOP: “BGF’s strategy is to continue to invest in our most successful businesses, and we are delighted to welcome the Blue Water team on board. ROVOP has weathered the storm caused by the oil industry downturn by providing the best equipment, the best people, and the best service to customers who need high reliability and efficiency. This partnership makes a step change in our ability to meet those customers’ demands.”
Graeme Sword, partner at BWE, states: “We look forward to the opportunity to work with an entrepreneur like Steven to drive further growth at ROVOP. Over the past six years, the company has established itself as a high-quality provider of ROV services to many of the leading oil and gas companies globally. As the energy market continues to grow for this specialist service, we see Steven and his team as the best placed to capitalise on this.”