Archive for August, 2009
Baker Hughes to Acquire BJ Services in $5.5 Billion Transaction
Combines BJ Services’ Leading Pressure Pumping Business with Baker Hughes’ Diversified International Franchise Allows Combined Company to More Effectively Compete for Integrated Projects and Accelerate International Growth Cost Synergies of $75 Million in 2010 and $150 Million in 2011
HOUSTON, Aug. 31 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Baker Hughes Incorporated (NYSE:BHI) and BJ Services Company (NYSE:BJS) today announced that their Boards of Directors have approved a definitive merger agreement, which represents a transaction value of $5.5 billion for BJ Services based on closing stock prices on August 28, 2009.
The agreement represents a premium to BJ Services stockholders of 16.3% over the closing price of BJ Services stock on August 28, 2009. Under the agreement, BJ Services stockholders will receive 0.40035 shares of Baker Hughes and cash of $2.69 in exchange for each share of BJ Services common stock. Upon closing, and reflecting the issuance of new Baker Hughes shares, BJ Services stockholders collectively will own approximately 27.5% of Baker Hughes’ outstanding shares.
“The transaction further enhances Baker Hughes’ position as a top-tier global oilfield services company,” said Chad C. Deaton, Baker Hughes chairman, president and chief executive officer. “BJ Services broadens our portfolio by adding products, technologies and talented people that are key to helping our customers unlock value in their reservoirs, particularly in unconventional gas and deepwater fields. It will better position us to drive international growth and to compete for the growing large integrated projects by incorporating pressure pumping into our product offering.
“Our two companies have highly complementary products and services with very little overlap. Baker Hughes has a long record of partnering with BJ Services on major projects. The proposed merger will make Baker Hughes a stronger, more efficient service provider for our customers worldwide, by integrating pressure pumping with Baker Hughes’ wide range of products and services.”
Baker Hughes expects to realize annual cost savings of approximately $75 million in 2010 and $150 million in 2011 as it eliminates redundant costs, consolidates facilities, and further rationalizes field costs. Baker Hughes expects the combination to be accretive to earnings per share in 2011.
The Baker Hughes Board of Directors will be expanded to include two BJ Services Board members.
BJ Services’ Chairman, President and CEO Bill Stewart said: “We are very pleased to be joining forces with Baker Hughes and believe that this is an attractive combination for all of BJ Services’ constituencies: customers will benefit from our wider and better-integrated array of services and technologies; our employees will enjoy the advantages and opportunities of being a part of a larger, stronger company; and BJ Services’ stockholders will have the opportunity to continue to participate in the success of the combined enterprise.”
Although pressure pumping accounted for less than 1% of Baker Hughes’ revenues in 2008, it is expected to generate approximately 20% of the combined company’s revenues, providing Baker Hughes with revenues from pressure pumping that approaches its two largest competitors. Pressure pumping has grown in importance as customers have looked for new ways to unlock the full value of their reservoirs. The number of fields requiring pressure pumping services is expected to grow, especially outside of North America, where BJ Services can leverage Baker Hughes’ extensive international presence as it pursues growth opportunities.
The merger is subject to the approval of both Baker Hughes’ and BJ Services’ stockholders as well as other customary approvals. The companies anticipate that the transaction could close as soon as the end of the calendar year. Baker Hughes and BJ Services intend to file a joint proxy statement / prospectus with the Securities and Exchange Commission as soon as possible.
Goldman, Sachs & Co. is acting as Baker Hughes’ financial advisor, and Baker Hughes’ legal advisors are Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, Fulbright & Jaworski L.L.P., Howrey L.L.P., and Morris, Nichols, Arsht & Tunnell LLP. Greenhill & Co. is acting as BJ Services’ financial advisor and rendered a fairness opinion to the Board of Directors. BofA Merrill Lynch Securities also rendered a separate fairness opinion to the Board of Directors of BJ Services. BJ Services’ legal advisors are Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP, and Andrews Kurth LLP.
Conference Call
Baker Hughes and BJ Services have scheduled a joint conference call today to discuss the merger. The call will begin at 8:30 a.m. Eastern time, 7:30 a.m. Central time, on August 31, 2009. To access the call, which is open to the public, please contact the conference call operator at (877) 382-1760 (877) 382-1760 , or (706) 758-8296 (706) 758-8296 for international callers, 20 minutes prior to the scheduled start time, and ask for the “Baker Hughes and BJ Services Conference Call.” A replay will be available through, September 28, 2009. The number for the replay is (800) 642-1687 (800) 642-1687 , or (706) 645-9291 (706) 645-9291 for international callers. The call and replay will also be web cast on http://www.bakerhughes.com and on http://www.bjservices.com. Today’s news release, along with other news about Baker Hughes and BJ Services, is available on the Internet at http://www.bakerhughes.com/investor in the “News and Events” section under “Events and Presentations” ; http://www.bjservices.com in the “Investors” section; and http://www.premieroilservices.com.
BP Taps Tata, Accenture, Infosys for Transformational IT Program
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), , an IT services, consulting, business solutions and outsourcing firm based in Mumbai, India, has been selected as a strategic IT vendor by BP, one of the world’s largest oil and gas companies with operations in more than 100 countries.
Over the last 12 months BP has undertaken a program to consolidate its IT vendors for application development and application maintenance (ADAM) using a rigorous selection process that assessed TCS on capability to deliver innovation, leverage Oil and Gas sector knowledge and reduce cost through a global network delivery model. TCS met these criteria and demonstrated its ability to support BP’s agenda of simplification, standardization and corporate efficiency.
Dana Deasy, BP Group CIO, said: “I’ve been very pleased with the quality of TCS’ proposal and to have selected them as one of our strategic ADAM vendors. In awarding TCS our refining, manufacturing and corporate IT maintenance work we look to benefit from their knowledge of the Oil and Gas sector. Additionally, we see opportunities for TCS to help us deliver IT solutions to enable our upstream and trading businesses. This contract will help BP to reduce complexity, standardize processes and lower our overall cost base.”
“The engagement with BP underscores our ability to help global corporations become more competitive in the current economic scenario by reducing complexity through optimization of their IT landscape and focus on delivering value through continuous innovation in services,” said N. Chandrasekaran, Chief Operating Officer and Executive Director, TCS. “Our selection as a strategic IT vendor for BP demonstrates our strong domain expertise and highlights the investments we have been making in the technology-led energy sector.”
TCS’ Energy Vertical serves international and national energy companies across the industry’s value chain. It also works with oilfield service companies on solutions that help increase the production and reliability of upstream operations.
Separately, BP announced it has also awarded Accenture a contract to provide information technology application development services. Terms of the contract were not disclosed. Accenture will help BP simplify, standardize and consolidate its IT software applications to meet BP’s goals of achieving efficiency throughout the organization and to manage IT costs. Under the agreement, Accenture will be BP’s strategic service provider for its SAP development work.
Said Deasy: “In awarding Accenture our SAP development work we look forward to taking advantage of their extensive SAP know-how and leveraging their deep understanding of the Oil and Gas industry. This contract will help BP to accelerate the implementation of SAP across the organization and lower our overall cost base.”
John Downie, senior executive with Accenture’s Energy industry group, said: “We are delighted that BP has selected Accenture as its strategic service provider for SAP development work. Our relationship with BP spans more than 20 years; we look forward to helping BP to further leverage its IT investments, increase operational performance and gain efficiencies.”
In yet another announcement about its ADAM program, BP revealed that Infosys Technologies will manage and operate a large portion of its business systems under the terms of a five-year applications outsourcing and support agreement.
Kris Gopalakrishnan, CEO and Managing Director of Infosys Technologies, said: “Infosys has a longstanding relationship with BP, delivering consulting and technology services. We are well positioned to use our global sourcing expertise and transformational capabilities in the oil and gas domain to deliver significant improvement in operational efficiencies to BP as a part of this new agreement.”
Quorum Licenses Upstream Suite to New Client
Houston-based Quorum Business Solutions Inc., provider of business and information technology solutions for the oil, gas and renewable energy industries, announced an agreement to license its full upstream suite of applications to an undisclosed company. The company will leverage Quorum Upstream Suite to manage its upstream accounting operations and commercial activities, including land management, capital budget tracking, production accounting, revenue accounting and financials (AP, AR, GL).
“There is a tremendous amount of data that must be processed and maintained in the upstream oil and gas business. Centralizing this in an ERP system enables companies to more efficiently manage their operations,” said Perry Turbes, CCO of Quorum. “Quorum Upstream Suite is a fully scalable set of applications that includes operations accounting and land management functionality, which enables E&P companies to improve business processes using automated workflows resulting in better, faster, more accurate transactions.”
The Quorum Upstream Suite is a set of comprehensive operations and accounting applications for the E&P industry. The suite includes functionality to manage:
- Authorization for Expenditure,
- Capital Budget Tracking,
- Equipment Inventory Management & Accounting,
- Financial Accounting,
- Fixed Assets & Depreciation Accounting,
- Joint Interest Billing,
- Gas Marketing,
- Land Management, and
- GIS.
Additionally, the suite is fully integrated with business intelligence and ad-hoc query and reporting tools.
The newly signed license agreement consists of Quorum Production Revenue Accounting, Quorum ERP and Quorum Land Suite. Quorum Production Revenue Accounting forecasts supply volumes to meet marketing needs as well as owner and contract allocations for actual volumes, and also includes contracts, division order, valuation, revenue distribution, check disbursement and regulatory / tax reporting. Quorum ERP allows for the planning of how business resources are accounted and utilized throughout an organization and consists of capital budget tracking, financial accounting, authorization for expenditure, joint interest billing, fixed assets and contract management. Quorum Land Suite streamlines complicated land management processes, such as managing payments, terms and obligations of leases, surface use agreements, contracts, and fee property and easement land data.
WellPoint Systems Releases WellPoint Intelligent Dashboard
WellPoint Systems announced the release of the WellPoint Intelligent Dashboard, which gives users easy, central access to critical industry and company data. It places powerful analytical reports and key performance indicators (KPI’s) directly into the hands of executives and operations personnel who need to measure financial, lease and production activity and performance accurately.
“The Dashboard is a very important addition to the WellPoint line of products,” said Richard Slack, President and CEO of WellPoint. “Research has shown that companies actively using dashboards are achieving higher performance than their peers, and adding this feature to our product offering highlights our ongoing commitment to providing solutions that help our customers run their businesses better.”
The Dashboard uses SQL Reporting Services and cube technology to aggregate data and measurements from WellPoint’s software as well as third-party applications. The system utilizes WellPoint’s data and a standard SQL Datastore to produce Business Intelligence objects.
Customers can easily connect to their data in the WellPoint systems and any other SQL compliant system, allowing them to create intelligent dashboards, providing analysis and insightful reports in just a few clicks.
BP Awards Big Application Services Contract to IBM
IBM announced that BP has awarded it a 5-year contract to manage and run all of the oil giant’s enterprise applications and integrated service desk responsibilities. The contract is the largest among multiple awards BP is making as part of a major program to simplify business processes while achieving new levels of service quality.
Over the last 12 months BP initiated a program to consolidate its IT vendors for application development and application maintenance (ADAM) with goals of simplifying its processes, improving service quality and enabling strategic partnership. BP had a rigorous procurement selection process to assess potential partners on capability, Oil and Gas sector knowledge and cost. IBM met these criteria and has demonstrated its ability to support BP’s agenda of simplification, standardization and corporate efficiency.
Dana Deasy, BP Group CIO, said: “I’ve been very pleased with the quality of IBM’s proposal and to have selected them as a strategic ADAM vendor for global SAP maintenance and system development center. We see a significant opportunity to simplify and standardize BP’s work processes while leveraging IBM’s world-class expertise in this area and their strong knowledge of the Oil and Gas industry. This contract will enable BP to reduce complexity, while lowering our overall cost base.”
IBM Global Business Services will manage BP’s SAP applications, including enhancements and continuous improvement both at client sites and from IBM’s network of global delivery centers.
“IBM is pleased to support BP’s enterprise transformation with our globally integrated application management capabilities,” said Frank Kern, Sr. VP, IBM Global Business Services. “IBM’s unmatched breadth of application management resources — combined with our deep industry expertise — will drive future growth and opportunity for our valued client.”
Carol Dinkins Joins UH Energy Advisory Board
Environmental litigator Carol E. Dinkins, a partner in the Houston office of the international law firm of Vinson & Elkins LLP, will join the newly formed Energy Advisory Board of the University of Houston (UH).
“Carol is an environmental legend in Texas and on a national level, particularly for regulatory and enforcement matters within the energy industry,” said UH President Renu Khator. “I am delighted she will support the University of Houston’s efforts to become ‘The Energy University’ and help guide the board toward achieving that goal.”
The advisory board, which will meet quarterly, is tasked with strategic planning and external coordination. Its next meeting is set for Oct. 28. In addition to Dinkins, board members include:
- Tim Cejka, president of ExxonMobil Exploration Co.;
- John Gibson Jr., president and CEO of Paradigm;
- John Hofmeister, chairman of the Greater Houston Partnership Energy Collaborative and founder and CEO of Citizens for Affordable Energy;
- Ryan Lance, Sr. VP, international exploration and production, ConocoPhillips;
- David McClanahan, president and CEO of CenterPoint Energy Inc.;
- Lamar McKay, chairman and president, BP America Inc.;
- Marvin Odum, president of Shell Oil Company and director of Royal Dutch Shell;
- H. David Ramm, partner of DKRW Energy LLC;
- Corbin Robertson Jr., chairman and CEO of Natural Resource Partners; and
- Bruce Williamson, chairman, president and CEO of Dynegy Inc.
Formation of the advisory board is the latest step in a roadmap laid out in Khator’s UH Energy Initiative, which aims to capitalize on the region’s and the university’s strategic interests and strengths. Involvement in energy-related initiatives spans virtually every UH college and includes faculty in a dozen disciplines.
GE Fanuc Announces DataViews 9.25 for Visualization
GE Fanuc Intelligent Platforms, a unit of GE Enterprise Solutions, announced the latest release of DataViews 9.25, a set of high-quality, graphic visualization development tools for building custom applications. The update includes new features that enhance performance of display updates, support the use of scalable text in input object templates, and allow the setting of background color for Scalable Text objects.
DataViews 9.25 also introduces 64-bit operating system support for Red Hat Enterprise Version 5.3. This key feature enables developers to gain further performance from their application by having their DataViews-built components harness the 64-bit instruction set directly without the need for emulation. This is a key element for applications displaying a large amount of data in real time as well as apps requiring high performance. With release 9.25, DataViews now supports SPARC Solaris 10, Intel Solaris x86, and Red Hat Enterprise 5.3 (32- and 64-bit). In addition, Java programmers can now develop their applications using the DataViews Java API for Java 2 v1.6
“With DataViews 9.25 running natively on a 64-bit platform, we’ve increased the ability to harness the next generation of 64-bit chipsets and push applications further,” said Mark Pipher, Product General Manager for HMI/SCADA products, GE Fanuc Intelligent Platforms. “This version introduces the capability to increase the application complexity and its visualization components, processing visualizations and data much faster when compared to 32-bit.”
DataViews is a dynamic visualization toolkit that allows customers to develop high-quality visualizations within their applications to meet their specific needs. After more than 15 years of ongoing development, the multi-platform support and powerful graphical development editor have been the keys to DataViews’ ongoing success.
“DataViews saves programmers significant development time,” continued Pipher, “and it allows graphical objects to be developed and imported quickly and easily, rather than having to develop them in code. It fits seamlessly in the application being developed and leverages industry standard solutions to save data connectivity development time.”
Fugro-Jason Updates Jason Geoscience Workbench
Fugro-Jason has announced the commercial release of JGW 8.1, the latest version of its flagship product Jason Geoscience Workbench. This version includes new AVO Attribute/Analysis and Full Waveform Synthetics applications. JGW integrates geological, geophysical, petrophysical and rock physics information into a single, consistent model of the earth. The new JGW 8.1 release also has a variety of enhancements to existing applications, including a new Spectral Decomposition module, improvements to the deterministic inversion and wavelet estimation algorithms, and numerous usability enhancements.
“With these new tools and enhancements, our customers will be able to do a better job of integrating traditional seismic AVO analysis and JGW seismic inversion,” said Joe Jacquot, Marketing Manager for Fugro-Jason. “This is the third release in a row to be released on schedule and driven by user requests, demonstrating our deep commitment to customers.”
AVO Attribute/Analysis
The new AVO Attribute/Analysis module will allow extraction of seismic AVA or AVO attributes from pre- or partial-stack seismic data. The options include:
•Shuey 2-term (intercept and gradient);
•Shuey 3-term (intercept, gradient and far-offset);
•Smith and Gidlow (Vp and Vs contrasts);
•Fatti, et al. (Zp and Zs contrasts); and
•Gray, et al. (λ, μ and ρ contrasts).
Full Waveform Synthetics
This add-on application to the Well Log Editor provides full waveform synthetics. Pre- and post-stack NMO synthetics with and without multiples can now be calculated. Using well control, this module allows users to analyze which seismic events are primaries and which ones are not, whereas in convolutional modeling all responses are presumed to be primaries.
SeaSCAN Acquires Shallow Draft Seismic Vessel from Fairfield
SeaSCAN, Inc., a shallow water seismic source provider, announced it has completed the purchase of the M/V SeaSCAN Speculator, a purpose-built vessel designed to operate marine seismic source air gun arrays in water depth as shallow as 1.5 m. The vessel is constructed of aluminum, with dual jet propulsion including two integrated 300 scf/m Price A300 air compressors. Using a custom launch and recovery “A” frame capable of lifting 7,000 lbs, the vessel can support a variety of SeaSCAN source arrays from 220 cu in., specially designed ultra-shallow water seismic source arrays, up to 2,400 cu in. Due to its portable and lightweight construction, it can be mobilized quickly and easily shipped as deck cargo anywhere in the world.
“We are pleased that with the acquisition of the Speculator, we are responding to the requests we have had from our customers to provide a turnkey, all-inclusive shooting package to acquire seismic data in ultra-shallow water (USW),” stated Harold Barber, president and founder of SeaSCAN Inc.
“SeaSCAN has earned a reputation for operational excellence by providing equipment redundancy, very experienced crews and an extensive spares and consumables list for every job. With the vessel’s dual, integrated air compressors, the company continues its focus on high quality performance,” said SeaSCAN Operations Manager, Patrick Higginbotham. “Now we can provide customers with a suite of capabilities, from full turnkey Tri-Cluster® or USW source packages to equipment and personnel only, using a client-provided vessel.”
After modifying the M/V SeaSCAN Speculator to better accommodate the SeaSCAN arrays, the vessel has already been mobilized for its first contract. Using 4,220 array sleds for a total of 880 cu in., the vessel will be shooting offshore Trinidad in less than 2.0 m of water.
Additional information on the vessel, including photographs can be found at: www.seascanseismic.com/SeaSCAN-Speculator.html
Pegasus Vertex Releases New Casing Wear Software
Pegasus Vertex Inc. (PVI) is an engineering consulting and drilling software company based in Houston. PVI’s software covers the areas of torque and drag, casing running, packer setting, centralizer replacement, cementing and underbalanced drilling. Designed for onshore and offshore operations, PVI’s software is used by both service companies and operators globally.
PVI just announced the release of CWPRO3 for Casing Wear Prediction. Casing wear can cause blowouts, production loss, and other hazardous and expensive problems. A better understanding of the casing wear process and prediction of the location and magnitude of casing wear can help drillers and operators identify, control and prevent potential problems.
CWPRO3 predicts casing wear from drilling operations based on hole trajectory, wellbore structure, drillpipe configuration and the mud system to be used. It displays the 3D well path with survey tortuosity and handles the following operations:
- Drilling;
- Back reaming;
- Rotation on bottom;
- Rotation off bottom;
- Wear factor selection;
- Casing wear reports and schematics; and
- Predicts burst or collapse of worn casing.
PetroComputing 