Plexus Holdings PLC (LON:POS) has received an order for its breakthrough technology from Nexen, which is owned by Chinese giant CNOOC.
It will supply its POS-GRIP wellhead and Tersus mudline equipment for use on the Glengorm exploration well in the Central North Sea.
Invented and developed by chief executive Ben van Bilderbeek and his team, POS-GRIP is Plexus’ primary product.
It is designed to reduce the chance of leakage and the danger of blow-outs, where oil or gas bursts out of pipes, following an unexpected rise in pressure.
The firm has supplied its equipment to several blue chip operators, including BP plc (LON:BP.), Maersk, Total (LON:TTA) and Statoil.
Because of installation time savings it confers, the technology might shave as many as 100 hours from the drilling programme.
On deep water applications and some high pressure, high temperature operations daily operating costs can run to US$800,000 to US$1mln a day.
Of the Nexan deal, Plexus CEO van Bilderbeek said: “It is particularly pleasing to have won today's order from this high calibre operator which is one of the largest producers in the UK North Sea and encouragingly continues to actively explore in the region.
"Before the oil price-induced downturn set in, the qualities of our best in class equipment in terms of performance, reliability, safety and time savings, had established Plexus as the dominant supplier of wellheads for jack-up exploration wells in the North Sea.”
He said management is confident that once exploration activity returns to the sector, the POS-GRIP wellhead technology, which has been used on over 400 wells worldwide, will tap into the recovery.
This latest deal is expected to be recognised in Pexus’ new financial, starting July 1.