ViaLogy (LON:VIY) says it now has a chance to show its seismic technology’s “enormous commercial potential” after securing an offshore contract from a Fortune 500 company.
Investors cheered the news, sending shares in the company up 15% in early deals.
The analysis targets large oilfields outside of the United States.
Under the performance assessments, ViaLogy will use its proprietary quantum seismic interferometry technology QuantumRD to delineate productive formations in a deepwater reservoir for a large offshore development prospect.
The offshore project requires that ViaLogy predict oil and/or gas bearing zones from 3D seismic data in a complex sandstone reservoir setting.
ViaLogy noted that de-risking such prospects usually relies on drilling multiple costly test wells because of the inability of conventional 3D seismic analysis to image fluids. The company’s technology provides services for a broad class of sandstone, carbonate and shale gas reservoirs to characterize formation porosity, lithology and map hydrocarbon presence.
According to the company, the value-add of QuantumRD is its ability to increase resolution of the seismic data to assess hydrocarbon presence and fluid saturation.
During testing in onshore US prospects, QuantumRD successfully positioned multiple wells and correctly explained the outcome of over 250 more wells.
QuantumRD will also be used to determine the attributes of a major onshore formation for the client.
The name of the client and the location of its projects were not disclosed. ViaLogy intends to delineate and size production grade hydrocarbon-bearing depositions in an onshore reservoir that spans several hundred square miles.
“These technology assessment projects are a major step forward for us, providing the opportunity to work in very large fields, showing the technology's capability offshore, and demonstrating its enormous commercial potential.
“In both of these offshore and onshore prospects currently available conventional seismic analysis technologies have thus far been unsuccessful,” said chief executive of ViaLogy Robert Dean.
The company has also reported that it has been approached by several US and non-US companies for de-risking both onshore and offshore prospects.