Paradigm Drilling Services said yesterday it had made a strong start to 2012, securing more than £1million of new contracts in the UK and overseas.
The Aberdeenshire firm has also signed a five-year lease on a 3,000 square-foot building adjacent to its Thainstone Business Park headquarters, including workshop and office space to expand its research and development facilities, with new drilling technology to be launched later this year.
A recruitment drive is under way with more than 30 people now in place and plans for a further 10 before the year-end, including a general manager and additional design engineers.
The recent wins include new manufacture and servicing contracts for stabilisers and hole openers and rental and sales contracts in the UK, Middle East, west Africa and South America. One contract alone is valued at £500,000 for the supply of tools to a client in Mexico.
Paradigm chairman Fraser Innes said: “We have had an extremely positive start to 2012 securing new contracts, particularly in target global regions.
“The new unit will enable us to greatly expand our research and development team and give our engineering staff a clean assembly and test area as well as additional offices.
“We have filed six new patents in the last year with the main focus on enabling technology for extended-reach drilling and completions.”
Paradigm Drilling Services, a subsidiary of Netherlands-based Paradigm Group, reported a turnover of £2.2million in 2011 and is expected to double this in 2012.
Mr Innes added: “While we continue to offer a multimillion pound inventory of equipment for sale and rent and have robust manufacturing capabilities, there will be a much bigger focus on new tools that get to the heart of industry challenges such as horizontal drilling.
“We are making a big investment in designing new technology then refining and testing it to offer new solutions to the marketplace. This year alone, Paradigm Group is investing a further £1million on top of our significant financial commitment.”