Muehlhan’s UK story starts in 2003. A subsidiary of Germany’s Muehlhan AG maritime surface protection group, headquartered in Hamburg, its brief was to focus on core strengths – supporting marine industries such as shiprepair, ship construction and offshore energy.
At that time, the company had offices in Southampton and Tyneside, with the main focus on supporting shiprepair specialists.
However, the opportunity to diversify into oil & gas finally emerged in 2006. That came up through a Shell contract via the Sigma 3 (North Sea) contractor alliance, covering installations in the Central and Northern North Sea.
The tender was successful and resulted in Muehlhan becoming involved in the upgrade of various Shell-operated platforms.
A strategic decision was taken to relocate the UK business to Aberdeen and concentrate on building a largely oil & gas-focused business, but with renewables offering considerable future potential too.
“We’ve been working for Shell via Sigma 3 since then, and are currently on four central sector assets: Anasuria, Gannet, Nelson and Shearwater,” said UK managing director, Jim West.
“Under current arrangements it looks like we’ll be there at least until the end of the year and, with the feedback we’re receiving from offshore for the work being carried out, we hope to be there longer.”
The Shell work currently keeps 50 of Muehlhan’s surface protection specialists busy, working on rotation with 25 offshore at any one time.
Besides being experts in their own discipline, all offshore employees are rope access technicians too. Indeed, all of Muehlhan’s North Sea offshore personnel are trained to a high level, including supervisors, with all being qualified paint inspectors trained to the NACE or equivalent standards.
All field personnel have also been trained and certificated in passive fire protection; a number have been trained in insulation techniques and a corrosion/insulation project manager was brought in to reinforce that aspect of the business.
Indeed, insulation and corrosions under insulation are seen as a growth activity offshore, as operators seek to extend the life of their fields and therefore infrastructure such as platforms.
To help with this Muehlhan have developed a CUI database, which they hope to offer to clients to store and manage data to assist with future maintenance planning.
The offshore squad can be reinforced by painting specialists provided by a sister company based at Gdansk in Poland, supplied direct from the shipyards and trained up to North Sea standards.
“This has been very successful,” said West. “They’ve been working on the Shell contract since 2007 and also on the TAQA Bratani platforms, North Cormorant and Eider, where we have provided fabric maintenance services to WGENS since 2009.”
While the offshore oil & gas industry is and will remain the mainstay of Muehlhan’s UK business, the company is now actively diversifying into other market sectors, but always with the focus on fabric maintenance.
To help accelerate growth, Muehlhan’s UK unit is looking at acquiring an existing scaffolding firm with an offshore pedigree. Muehlhan already has a considerable track record in scaffolding services in Europe and therefore ample in-house expertise to call upon. Indeed, the company is one of the largest scaffolding services providers in Germany.
“Adding scaffolding to our existing North Sea business will enable us to bid bigger contracts,” said West.
Furthermore, with signs of recovery in the wider marine industries market in Britain, the plan is to return to that sector, plus offer the group’s expertise for major onshore infrastructure maintenance, such as bridges. “We’re ambitious. We’ve invested heavily in training our people and we have the parent company’s agreement to continue with that investment this year,” said West.
Some £2.5million was ploughed into honing the skills of the North Sea workforce over the period 2006-2007, with a further £500,000 invested during 2010 and £500,000 for the current year. This budget will enable training of personnel for insulation and fireproofing, plus purchase of further fireproofing equipment.
Aside from growing the oil & gas side of the UK business, the other long term and large maritime energy prize in Muehlhan’s sights is offshore wind. The company, through its Danish and Polish business units, already has significant experience in supporting windfarms in various parts of continental Europe and the UK.
The North Sea turbine population has already passed the 1,000 mark, with many located in UK waters.
Within a decade they will be numbered in their thousands and Muehlhan considers itself to be well equipped to capitalise on the opportunity, especially since all offshore personnel are already trained in rope access skills.
“We’ve also developed robotic technology for the painting of the turbines,” said West.
An office is about to be opened in Yarmouth, as this is convenient to the current centre of windfarm construction activity in the UK.
“Yarmouth is a key location for us and not just for wind, as there is significant gas-related onshore infrastructure down there.”
More jobs are in the pipeline, especially in Aberdeen, where the headcount is now past 70 and expected to climb past the 100 mark within a relatively short time and 120 by the end of the year.
“And we have an advantage in the fact that we can also draw upon the wider Muehlhan group where necessary for skilled personnel and other resources,” added West.