Sembmarine share price dips below S$0.08 offer price; customer to move unfinished vessel out of yard

SHARES of Sembcorp Marine (Sembmarine) ended at S$0.079 on Friday (Oct 22), below the S$0.08 offer price set by Temasek in its mandatory general offer last month.

This comes as a media report on Thursday said that Sembmarine's work on the Johan Castberg vessel has been hit by "serious manpower shortages" due to the pandemic, and the project owner is set to transport the unfinished components from Singapore to Norway.

According to the report by trade publication Upstream, Norwegian energy company Equinor will transport the unfinished hull and turret for the Johan Castberg floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel to Norway, due to delays and escalating costs. These components were being built at Sembmarine's yard, the report said.

Sembmarine had secured its contract in 2017 with Equinor, previously known as Statoil. Worth US$490 million, the contract was for turnkey engineering, procurement and construction of hull and living quarters of the vessel, which is to be deployed in the Johan Castberg field in the Barents Sea.

An Equinor spokesperson cited in the report confirmed that the turret, which had been transported from Dubai to Singapore last year, will leave for Norway in December. The hull will be moved in early 2022.

Citing Equinor and contractor sources, the report said that Sembmarine's manpower difficulties mean that the turret installation phase will now be carried out at another yard in Stord, Norway. Equinor had originally planned to use 350,000 man-hours at Stord for the job, but the scope has now increased to 2.5 million man-hours, the report added.

Upstream's report comes as Temasek's offer for Sembmarine is set to close on Nov 3. The offer was triggered last month after Startree Investments, an indirect wholly owned unit of Temasek, announced that it will pick up 49.3 per cent of Sembmarine's rights issue, raising its stake in the company to 46.6 per cent. The S$0.08 offer price is in line with the rights issue price. Startree intends to keep Sembmarine listed on the Singapore Exchange.

The Business Times has reached out to Sembmarine for comment. Shares of the mainboard-listed company were heavily traded on Friday, with some 57.3 million shares changing hands.

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