![Quick updates: Bourbon vessel sales; Kotug buys Vortex; Atlantic Towing sold to J. P. Morgan; IWS and Dong Fang order more windfarm support ships [Offshore Accounts]](http://media.assettype.com/bairdmaritime%2F2026-10-05%2Frfifkjfq%2FUntitled-May-13-2026-at-09.00.32.jpeg?w=480&auto=format%2Ccompress&fit=max)
Last week, we did a deep dive into the difficult choices contractors have to make in the dispute between Argentina and the UK over the sovereignty of the Falkland Islands. President Milei has decreed that offshore players who work in the Falklands will be banned from working in Argentina and may face criminal prosecution there.
The development of Sea Lion, a remote field in an unforgiving harsh environment location, is symptomatic of the renewed interest in new fields to provide energy security now that Persian Gulf oil exports remain reduced and the oil price continues to hover around US$100 per barrel.
This week we look at the yet more, big dollar, dealmaking in offshore. The market is hot.
In early September, the 150-ton active heave compensated crane, DP3 subsea vessel Bourbon Evolution 806 achieved a record price of US$60.4 million in an online auction as part of the disposal of the fleet of vessels formerly leased by French player Bourbon, but owned by the Chinese bank ICBC. Bourbon had defaulted on the leases, so ICBC initiated a disposal sale, which has so far encompassed 34 successful sales, being 12 platform supply vessels (PSVs) with up to 1,000 square metres of clear deck each, 16 DP2, diesel-electric anchor handling tug supply vessels (AHTS) of around 80 tons bollard pull, and six subsea vessels.
Only a few months ago, Astro Offshore acquired the 2014-built sister ship Bourbon Evolution 807 for US$35 million in the same process, then Indonesian buyers acquired Bourbon Evolution 805 for US$46.5 million, and as prices rose, mysterious (Seychelles-based?) buyers acquired Bourbon Evolution 808 for US$52.06 million. Every sale in the series has generated ever higher prices for the subsea ships this year and only one more of the series remains in the ICBC books, Bourbon Evolution 804, which is scheduled to be sold in the coming weeks.
Seeing the rising prices, the Chinese buyers who bought the laid-up and long cold-stacked Bourbon Evolution 801 and 803 in Abidjan in 2025 have now returned to the Shipbid online auction house to flip the first of the assets they have spent the last year restoring at great expense in China. They have re-registered the ships to the Singapore flag and renamed them. Now known at Tidebon 801, the former 2011-built Bourbon Evolution 801 will be offered for sale with a reserve price of US$52.9 million on October 29 restored to class and back in service.
It was originally sold for US$14.1 million after four years in lay-up and a couple of failed auctions where it did not meet the reserve price, which was gradually dropped until it sold. The 2013-built sister ship now known as Tidebon 803 had been laid up for seven years when it was finally sold in 2025 for US$17 million.
The American and Israeli attack on Iran has transformed the oil and gas markets, providing the opportunity for a massive profit for those who took the gamble to buy this pair of subsea ships in appalling condition in Africa, load them on a heavy lift ship and take the vessels to China for repair. Taking a vessel that was out of class for so long and refurbishing it is a leap of faith, and my guess is that the vessel is higher risk than the recent sales of ships that were already in service, fully classed and had worked for Bourbon up to the time of the sale.
I would feel more confident if the reserve price was set in the US$40 million range, allowing auction fever to sweep the price upwards. Some of the recent Bourbon Evolution auctions lasted for hours (seven hours in the case of 806) and saw literally hundreds of bids offered on the Shipbid platform in US$20,000 increments as buyers scrambled to acquire tonnage in a bidding frenzy. Now that there are three ships in play, rather than just one from ICBC, the dynamics change. Let’s see if the US$52.9 million reserve price is right.
One place where millionaires are regularly minted in offshore is the UAE. In 2025, Adani Ports closed the acquisition of 80 per cent of Astro Offshore for US$185 million, making millionaires of Astro’s two remaining founders, and making obvious use of AI in the press release:
“This is more than a business deal — it’s a bold leap into the future.”
Who can forget the sale of Zakher Marine International to state-owned ADNOC Logistics and Services in early 2022, transferring 24 jackup barges and 38 offshore support vessels (OSVs) to the Abu Dhabi-based company, making a multi-millionaire of owner Hasan Al Ali when it sold it, and providing the springboard funds for his formation of HEA Energy in a similar line of business? Interestingly, ADNOC chose to keep his son Ali Hassan El Ali as CEO of Zakher under its ownership, and then chose to buy additional vessels from HEA Energy. No imputation of impropriety is implied by this observation.
Private equity fund SHUAA Capital of Abu Dhabi first bought Stanford Marine for US$308 million in 2021, and then, in March 2022 added Allianz Marine and Logistics and its very diverse fleet of over 100 craft working mainly in the UAE to its portfolio, creating a welcome windfall for the owners and senior leadership team at Allianz. Fill your pockets, boys!
In early 2025, MAG Offshore Investments announced the “strategic acquisition” of Singapore-listed Atlantic Navigation’s 20-Strong OSV fleet, minting founder and CEO Bill Wong into the industry’s rich list when it bought the business for a reported US$183 million.
Now there is another Emirates-based multi-millionaire profiting from the sale of yet another offshore fleet.
As we reported last Thursday, Kotug International announced that it had taken a majority interest in Dubai-based Vortex Offshore, taking a punt that the war in the Missile Middle East will not permanently impede offshore operations in the Persian Gulf. This transaction made an undisclosed figure for Mr Edwin Westerhof, founder and Managing Director of Vortex. Ironically, he had previously worked for Marsol International in the Middle East until he created Vortex in 2010. Kotug acquired UAE-based Marsol International in 2020.
No value was given for the transaction, which involved the eclectic fleet of Vortex’ eleven offshore vessels with an average age of over eleven years, being three DP2 AHTS (the 2009-built Valiant Vortex is the most powerful), two DP1 AHTS of 110 tons bollard pull, both built in 2010, four ASD vessels of 70 tons bollard pull and two crewboats.
The jewels in the crown are four newbuilding DP2, Fifi1 AHTS in China, which are expected to be delivered in 2027. These four new anchor handlers are reported to have long-term, 15-year contracts with KJO, which operates an oil field on the maritime border between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Vortex already has at least one vessel on a long-term charter with that client, the 2022-built ASD tug Vortex Vega.
Of course, if the Strait of Hormuz remains closed, it is not clear how these four newbuild vessels would be able to reach their customer to go on-hire in Khafji, or at what cost. With the restrictions on tanker loading by KJO, and the Kuwaiti and Saudi Arabian state oil companies KOC and Aramco due to a lack of export capacity, it is not clear whether the operation the Vortex ships were chartered to complete will still be needed if the conflict continues for the long term. Recall how few people in 2022 foresaw a five-year conflict in Ukraine, but here we are in the fifth year now with Russian casualties running of over a million killed or seriously injured and a significant percentage of Russian refining capacity destroyed or damaged by Ukrainian drone and missile strikes.
We congratulate Mr Westerhof on the sale of his fleet amid the turmoil of the conflict and we wish Kotug every success in implementing the company’s ambitious (and capital-intensive) business plan.
Kotug is a family-owned Dutch company with a long term and successful track record in terminal operations and tug management.
The same cannot be said of the purchaser involved in the other big offshore purchase last month… JP Morgan Asset Management’s Global Transportation Group, which bought Atlantic Towing’s offshore division from Canadian conglomerate JD Irving,
The company is now being renamed Sterling Atlantic Offshore (which is very confusing as there is already an investment company called Sterling Atlantic here). The fleet consists of four PSVs, being Atlantic Shrike, Atlantic Heron, Atlantic Griffon, and Paul A. Sacuta, and one AHTS, the 2012-built, 180-tonner Atlantic Merlin. All five ships are employed under long-term contracts on the Grand Banks off Canada’s Atlantic coast supporting oil and gas operations.
It marks a sad end for JD Irving’s involvement in offshore, after steadily shrinking the fleet. In 2025, the sister vessel to Atlantic Merlin, Atlantic Kestrel, also 2012-built, was sold to Viking Supply Ships and now trades as Ben Viking off Canada under Sea1 management, whilst the 2010-built PSV Atlantic Condor was sold to Vega Offshore of the UAE in 2023, and now trades in Nigeria as Vega Juniz.
No price was given for the purchase, but now the five-year clock is ticking on when JP Morgan will likely flip the assets having leveraged up the business and squeezed out some cost.
One of the reddest of red flags in the shipping industry is the orderbook. Sectors that have large orderbooks of newbuilds must either grow phenomenally fast to absorb the large fleet of new ships being delivered from shipyards, or must see day rates and utilisation collapse as a surfeit of new vessels hits the market and leads to price competition and an excess of supply.
The limited orderbook is why I am confident in the offshore sector and why JP Morgan, Adani Ports, MAG Offshore, Britoil, Kotug and all the other big spenders of recent years can sleep reasonably comfortably. Only seven per cent of the current PSV fleet is on order in the yards, so attrition should absorb this tonnage when it hits the market, although the low rates reportedly achieved by the Sinopacific-designed PSV newbuildings in Nigeria suggest that perhaps some business cases might be overly ambitious. The owners are not losing money, even if they are perhaps losing face at rates that 15-year-old vessels are achieving elsewhere.
The AHTS orderbook is similarly small, and the subsea orderbook stands at less than 15 per cent of the subsea fleet, again reinforcing the second-hand prices achieved by the Bourbon Evolution auctions.
So, according to Pareto Securities’ newbuild data, which segment has the highest order book of all? You might guess tankers, where VLCCs are sizzling with day rates of over one million dollars a day. Close, as the crude tanker orderbook stands at 28 per cent of the global fleet.
How about LNG and LPG carriers, whose rates shot up after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, spiking the orderbook as the US turned on the LNG export supply? Close, as these segments have around 38 per cent of their existing fleet on order.
You might make a stab at containerships then, where the big operators MSC, CMA-CGM and Maersk have embarked on what is technically called a “pissing contest” to expand their fleets on the back of the excess profits they earned in Covid and the subsequent Red Sea disruptions, which sent boxships around the Cape? Indeed, the container fleet has 40 per cent of the current global fleet on order, presaging what would surely be the mother of all rate wars between the liner trades when the steel hits the water.
But the winner, exceeding even the vanity of the containership owners and the greedy Greek tanker barons, is the offshore wind commissioning service operation vessel and service operation vessel fleet, which we will collectively refer to as C/SOVs given the increased blurring between the two categories.
At the start of September, newbuildings under construction amounted to 44 per cent of the existing on-water C/SOV fleet. 44 per cent! This year will see a record 22 ships in this category being delivered from yards. These are expensive, high-technology vessels with accommodation for up to 120 passengers in single or double cabins, 3D cranes, walk-to-work gangways and DP2. Whilst the market has remained strong through the northern hemisphere summer, the size of the orderbook compels us to ask how long this can continue.
Fearnleys' excellent market report issued at the end of August indicated that nine newbuild C/SOVs were delivered between May and the end of August but that the market was tight in Europe with spot fixtures reaching US$70,000 per day. Fearnleys noted that, “the market absorbed the additional tonnage without difficulty.”
How many times have we heard that before a major shipping market crashes?
However, the Fearnleys analyst then went on to observe that construction delays were the, “main driver behind the tight summer market,” as newbuild C/SOVs were delayed in the yard (five of the deliveries had been delayed more than six months) and several large off wind farms also faced construction delays.
Petrobras’ discovery that these C/SOVs are considerably cheaper than large semi-sub floatels for smaller projects has also helped maintain C/SOV market resilience following its successful charter of Norwind Gale and latterly REM Wind. Now, newbuild C/SOVs Windcat Haarlem and Windcat Antwerpen owned by CMB have been recently awarded 830 day charters with Petrobras.
In 2021, offshore wind demand for walk-to-work vessels saved provided a welcome boost to the subsea sector. Now in 2027, I forecast oil and gas demand will be a safety net for the C/SOV fleet.
A safety net it sorely needs.
A quick search in our own publication here shows the vast numbers of orders and naming ceremonies taking place. Last Friday, we reported Acta Marine christened its second hybrid C/SOV in a series (Acta Hercules), a few days before that it was Windward Offshore formally named the third hybrid C/SOV in a series (Windward Munich) just after a fourth hybrid C/SOV from that same series was delivered (Windward Hamburg on September 7).
A 44 per cent orderbook requires ordering restraint by owners and a huge pipeline of future work, a pipeline that is starting to look somewhat sketchy as projects face cost overruns, delays in permitting to connect to the grid and scepticism over offshore wind’s return on capital for electricity generators.
The wind market is growing, but not as strongly as forecast a few years back. Owners are showing no restraint in ordering.
Taiwan tussle over newbuild C/SOVs
Our caution has not stopped a dogfight developing between owners in Asia. On September 25, Japanese shipowner NYK announced it had ordered an Ulstein-designed, 89-metre SOV from the PaxOcean Group, for delivery around 2029 for deployment in offshore wind projects in Taiwan under a partnership with Taiwanese players IOVTEC and Hsin Chien Marine.
This came just two days after Taiwan’s Dong Fang Offshore announced that it too had signed a newbuild C/SOV contract with Norwegian shipbuilder Vard for a 102-metre LOA project valued between €66 million (US$75 million) and €75 million (US$85 million), with delivery due in the third quarter of 2028 from Vard’s Vung Tau yard in Vietnam. Dong Fang had only just taken delivery of the C/SOV Orient Inspirer from Vard Vung Tau a few days before and Orient Innovator, its sister ship, is fitting out there for delivery shortly.
Meanwhile, construction is nearly completed on the second of two C/SOVs for Taiwanese offshore wind vessel operator Ta San Shang Marine (TSSM). TSS Challenger is scheduled for delivery in early 2027 and will operate in support of offshore wind construction and maintenance projects in Taiwanese waters alongside its sister vessel, TSS Cruiser, which was also built for TSSM and which delivered earlier this year. Adding to the Taiwanese dogfight, Marco Polo Marine of Singapore took delivery its C/SOV MP Wind Archer at the end of last year and put it on contract out of Taichung.
But the mother of all orders did not come from Asia. It came from the capital of speculative over-ordering in offshore: Oslo.
On September 30, Integrated Wind Solutions (IWS) announced that it had entered into contracts for the construction of four new so-called "Skywalker-class" C/SOVs, which will grow its C/SOV fleet from six to ten such vessels.
The company announced on social media that the newbuildings will be based on a Kongsberg Maritime design and equipped with 3D motion-compensated cranes and gangway systems supplied by MacGregor (the standard C/SOV package, basically). IWS is 41 per cent owned by Awilco, part of the Awilhelmsen Group, which was established in 1939, and which still owns part of cruise ship owner the Royal Caribbean Group.
The new C/SOVs are scheduled for delivery in 2029 and 2030 from Nantong Rainbow Offshore and Engineering Equipment in China, which recently built some of the Sinopacific PSVs mentioned above. In addition to the four firm newbuildings, IWS Fleet has secured four more optional vessels as well, news will which surely fill those waiting for an oversupply of expensive ships at low rates with delight.
The newbuild announcement closed with the words, “building the next chapter of IWS Fleet,” and what looked like either a rocket emoji (or some kind of pink instrument of pleasure).🚀
Let’s hope the next chapter for IWS doesn’t involve Chapter Eleven or its equivalents in 2030 (such is the shipping cycle timeframe), but such a large orderbook normally presages disaster for owners. It is unlikely to bring much pleasure to competitors in coming years.
Background reading
Our September 2024 piece “The deal-making landscape: Atlantic Navigation and Astro Offshore sold as much unfinished business awaits buyers” highlighted not only the Astro and Atlantic Navigation deals, but also many of the subsequent follow-on sales – including the Hayfin AHTS sales to AHTS AS, Hornbeck (which finally merged with Helix this year) and the disposal of the Southpoint fleet. At last, DDW Offshore finally sold its last AHTS, the 191-ton bollard pull, 2010-built Skandi Peregrino to AHTS AS for approximately US$ 21.6 million last week. We wonder what mark-up was added when the ship was flipped into the public company…
The Vroon emergency response fleet in the North Sea is reportedly also up for sale with a rumoured price of around US$130 million from the consortium of banks that control the Dutch parent company.
Our coverage of Dong Fang’s "go west" strategy a year ago is here.
