Page 25 - The ROV Manual - A User Guide for Remotely Operated Vehicles 2nd edition

• Plug and abandonment (P&A) of subsea valve trees and templates
• Umbilical and pipeline system recovery and decommissioning
• Subsea development survey, salvage, installation of long baseline (LBL) acoustic arrays
• Jumper and flying lead installations
• Strake installations to tension leg platforms
• Hydrotesting and commissioning subsea field developments
• Steel catenary riser tie-in, inspection, repair, and maintenance
• Mattress installations and crossing of pipelines, flowlines, and umbilical
• Platform and pipeline inspections to regulatory standards
The clear-bottom “survey” functions can be accomplished with logic-driven equipment and fall more within the survey function than within the construction function. The logic-driven vehicles are the AUVs and fall more within the traditional services of the survey company (i.e., outside of the traditional service offerings of ROV service companies). Construction/IRM-type robotic ser- vices require a more active approach to subsea vehicle control—which requires a teleoperated vehi- cle (i.e., ROV) for active “man-in-the-loop” control.
As a day rate player, the ROV service company’s primary (some would say, “only”) function is to have “uptime.” As a project management company, the primary function is to get tasks accom- plished. As a “day rater” (DR), the goal is to have sufficient equipment to get the job and stay on the job. As a “project manager” (PM), the goal is to have access to a large menu of services so as to have them available when needed in order to fulfill the end goal (a completed task). The PM company is farther up the proverbial “food chain” as it manages its own projects (as opposed to taking directions from a PM). The deepwater intervention market is the realm of the ROV. Required of the PM or DR company is ROVs with sufficient capability to deliver sensors and tool- ing for the deepwater environment.
The end product for a DR company is the delivery of either sensors or tooling to the work site with maximum uptime. The end product of a PM company is to accomplish an assigned project (as outlined by the customer). In the risk/reward curve, the PM company stands a much higher opera- tional and financial risk with a corresponding potential for huge profits. The DR player has a much lower risk profile with a correspondingly lower profit upside.
The major players within the industry fall out to either day rate players or project management players. The smaller OCROV and MSROV service companies generally own and operate their equipment aboard the client’s vessel of opportunity. The typical day rate players in the WCROV space are boat companies who use the ROV to sell the boat due to the substantial cost of mobiliz- ing the WCROV spread onto the vessel (Section 1.2.1). The typical project management company has the ROV services as one of the many tools within the tool chest.
On the day rate front, the investment (and hence the reward) is in the boat—not (significantly) in the ROV. The boat companies are willing to go to a very low (or zero!) day rate on the ROV by hiding the ROV’s day rate in the vessel day rate. This squeezes out any would-be purely day rate WCROV-only companies.
“Is it an ROV vessel or is it a boat with ROV capability?” This is an important question. It de- cides on the risk for downtime (the main purpose of a day rate company) should (when) the ROV encounter operational or maintenance issues. Most DR companies resolve this issue by splitting the customer contracts between the ROV company and the vessel company, thereby compartmentalizing
1.2 Types of ROV services 13