Leco Marine AS

Oceans of potential

Leco Marine is trusted by rig owners all around the world thanks to its reputation as an experienced and reliable supplier of cost and time effective ways of serving the underwater part of semi-subs and large vessels.

The company boasts a wide range of subsea capabilities within diving, ROV operations, engineering services and vessel operations – and it has strived to continuously develop its offering over the years in order to provide the best possible service to customers.

Elaborating on Leco’s history and latest company development, Alf Egil Lønning, Leco Marine’s managing director says: “The company was established in 1983 as a highly specialised diving company. It underwent a name change from Leco Dive to Leco Marine, and it has changed owners a few times. More recently we have become part of Aak Group, which has a total employee level of about 170 whereas Leco Marine has about 15 staff and hires in extra people when necessary.”

Discussing the services Leco Marine offers clients at present, Alf adds: “In terms of our business today, we are undertaking marine support services, by which I mean mechanical work on oilrigs and FPSOs offshore. We also work on SPSs rigs onshore. Our work includes chain inspection and repair of rig chains, and we repair rigs and FPSOs out at sea. With engineering, we are undertaking EPCI contracts and have an expanding strategy in all our companies, and we’re working to establish ourselves in the international market – first in Europe and then the rest of the world.”

What may prove to be key to the company’s successful expansion is its acquisition by Aak Group, a firm that possess the expertise to deliver services designed specifically for demanding environments. Common elements in all of Aak Group’s businesses are expertise, innovation, quality and safety, which is why the organisations that form Aak Group boast broad experience and highly qualified staff. Aak prides itself on being able to put together a multi-disciplinary team with effective methods, equipment and tools appropriate for the mission and customer needs.

The move to Aak Group was a wise move, Alf asserts: “As a result, we are going to conduct more marketing with Aak and undertake projects together with the Group. It’s a good strength for us to have, seeing as we are small as a company. Being a part of Aak, which is such a large organisation, puts an end to this issue of size. We are training our people at the moment to go into Aak and together we are going to train a mix of our operators. On an operational basis we are going to include ourselves in each other’s projects.”

Even before Leco joined forces with Aak it was attracting high profile clients who recognised, and wanted to utilise, its impressive the knowledge base. Indeed, Alf confirms that Leco’s biggest customer is Statoil Hydro. Speaking about work completed for the company, Alf reveals: “We were chosen to perform a thruster changeout operation offshore, which we completed recently, and we have also been conducting cofferdam operations on one of its platforms called Veslefrikk. Other customers of ours include rig owners such as Odfell and we’re marketing to every rig owner in the North Sea.”

Continuing, Alf adds: “We have always worked on changing thrusters, so we have a lot of experience with rigs and FPSOs, both on-andoffshore. That is our core business although two years ago we also started undertaking chain inspection, which is very interesting to us. Coming up, we’re conducting a thruster changeout during September and we’re currently starting pre-work. That total project for us will engage 15 workers.”

Owing to the benefits of new ownership and Leco’s ongoing commitment to delivering to clients exactly what they require, Alf is confident the company can look forward to a prosperous future: “Even if the market is a little poor compared with last year, the oil price is not that bad at the moment, so the oil and gas industry is managing. We think the situation is ideal for us to expand, as it’s not always easy to expand when the market is really busy.

“Five years from now I see Leco Marine remaining part of Aak Group and being able to take on much bigger projects and develop a group of personnel that is able to produce solutions for customers that are cost effective; I believe that we have to solve problems for customers in order to survive. If we’re hiring talented problem solvers who are customer-oriented then we will do well. As long as we’re expanding together with our customers whilst building strong relations with them, we will have achieved our goal for the future. Many oil and gas companies will be hearing a lot more from Aak and Leco in the future because our strategy is to develop, expand and undertake work together.”

Leco Marine AS

Services: Inspection, repair and maintenance