CGG has announced the creation of a new company with longstanding partner Eidesvik and its Nordic lenders that will establish a new ownership set-up for its operated fleet.
In a statement CGG said the new company would take possession of the five vessels currently owned by CGG which were cold-stacked, Geo Coral, Geo Caribbean, Geo Celtic, CGG Alize and Oceanic Challenger, as well as the two vessels co-owned by CGG and Eidesvik, Oceanic Vega and Oceanic Sirius.
The new company will be jointly and equally owned by CGG and Eidvisk and will carry all outstanding debts related to the vessels. It is expected to be operational from April this year.
CGG said it will continue to charter the Oceanic Vega and Oceanic Sirius from the new Company and will charter the Geo Coral from the second quarter onwards and the Geo Caribbean and Geo Celtic as the charters of other vessels it currently operates expire. CGG said it will thus continue operating a five 3D vessel fleet with the same maritime and seismic operational management.
The charter rates, agreed as part of the set up, will enable CGG to substantially reduce charter costs. The company said the new contractual terms had been mainly obtained through the re-profiling of the reimbursement schedule of the debt related to the vessels coupled with an extension of the vessels employment commitments.
CGG said the new set-up would also reduce its gross debt by about $182.5m, corresponding to the principal amount of the Nordic loan at April 1, 2017.
Jean-Georges Malcor, CGG CEO, said: “After the implementation of our marine Transformation Plan, launched at the end of 2013, which led to a sharp decrease of our internal cost base, our objective was to further improve our competitiveness by renegotiating the charter costs for our operated fleet. Today’s agreement in principle with our Nordic lenders, combined with the strengthening and extension of our partnership with Eidesvik, will allow us to reach this goal by leading to a further reduction of our marine operational cost and will also allow us to reduce substantially our financial costs via the externalization of the existing Nordic loan.”
CGG and Eidesvik create new fleet ownership company
Posted by | 27/03/2017
