Our Offshore Oil reporting

James Fisher's Offshore Oil businesses supply a range of services and equipment to the global oil and gas and renewable energy industries.

This includes the design and engineering of specialist equipment and technology, specialised artificial lift completion technology, platform maintenance and modification, well testing support, and subsea operations and maintenance services.

2022 Divisional performance:

The Offshore Oil division continued its positive momentum from 2021, achieving 23.5% revenue growth to £106.6m (2021: £86.3m) and 36.9% underlying operating profit growth to £15.2m (2021: £11.1m).

All businesses within the division achieved growth in the year, with RMSPumptools delivering a particularly strong 42.7% growth in revenue, resulting in a strong performance for that business. High demand for its artificial lift products, which extend the life of oil wells, has continued into 2023, with a strong order book to start the year.

The ScanTech businesses, which principally provide well-testing services to the oil and gas industry and bubble curtain services to the offshore wind construction market achieved 17.9% revenue growth. The Group’s innovative bubble curtain solutions, which provide a ‘wall of air’ to protect wildlife from the noise of piling activity in offshore wind construction projects delivered growth of 13.9% from £7.2m to £8.2m. Demand for well-testing services remained at high levels as the oil and gas industry more broadly sought to minimise the impact of the conflict in Ukraine on global energy supplies.

James Fisher Offshore, which provides equipment rentals to offshore operators and decommissioning services to the oil and gas industry continued to make positive progress. Revenue from decommissioning projects in 2022 showed good growth to £11.7m from £7.1m in 2021. We were pleased to complete at the end of the year the first project with the new Seabass technology, which was acquired in 2021. Decommissioning remains an early stage opportunity for the Group, but it is a potentially significant market opportunity over the longer term.

In 2021, adjusting items of £16.3m were recognised in relation to goodwill impairment (£13.9m) and receivables £1.9m. The Group continues to pursue the recovery of the receivables balance, which related to one specific counterparty that is in a scheme of arrangement process and is hopeful of a resolution during 2023.