Ventura Takes On Deep Value Driller and a $58m Petronas Well

Ventura Offshore has agreed to provide marketing and operations management for the seventh-generation ultra-deepwater drillship Deep Value Driller and has signed a one-well drilling contract with Petronas in Indonesia valued at around $58m. The Oslo-listed contractor set out both steps in a company statement.

The management deal is with Eldorado Drilling and expands a managed fleet that already includes Eldorado's Atlantic Zonda. The distinction matters to the revenue line: the $58m figure covers the drilling contract including provisional sums for additional services, but Ventura is entitled to operating fees rather than to the contract value itself.

The award is with Petronas E&P Bobara, operator of the ultra-deepwater Bobara production sharing contract off Papua Barat. The block covers roughly 8,400 square kilometres and was the Malaysian company's first operated deepwater acreage in Indonesia. Pertamina and TotalEnergies were brought into the licence last year, each taking 24.5%, with Petronas retaining 51% and operatorship.

It is the second Indonesian commitment on the manager's books, alongside the SSV Catarina, which is already working in the country.

The drillship itself has had a contested recent history. Eldorado agreed in February to pay $300m for the 2014-built unit, topping a previously agreed $272.5m offer from Saipem, with delivery scheduled during the third quarter. A one-well programme secured within months of that delivery puts the asset to work quickly, although a single well is a short contract by ultra-deepwater standards and leaves the rig's 2027 position open.

For a contractor built around management services rather than ownership, each addition of this kind lengthens the fleet under commercial control without adding the capital cost of a rig, and the fee stream scales with utilisation rather than with day rates alone.

This story is part of the Maritime Briefing of 12 September 2026.