GE Expands Scottish Subsea Facility

GE Oil & Gas formally opened its expanded subsea manufacturing, test and assembly facility in Montrose, Scotland, Thursday. The Scottish government's Secretary for Finance, Employment and Sustainable Growth John Swinney opened the Brent Avenue facility after GE spent $16 million on its expansion.

The expansion includes a new 2,250-square meter assembly and test facility, which will allow for the in-house manufacturing of large, deepwater horizontal subsea trees (DHXTs) used in the extraction of oil and gas reserves from the seabed in some of the most challenging environments across the globe. Much larger vertical tree systems (DVXTs) will also be able to be built.

The expansion increases the facility's machining capacity by more than 40 percent while it will be able to build more than 90 subsea systems per year compared to 63 per year previously.

GE said that the investment was prompted by growing subsea activity and GE's increased market share in the sector. The number of staff at the facility is expected to increase from 85 people to 138 during the remainder of 2013.

GE Oil & Gas Subsea Systems CEO Rod Christie commented in a company statement:

"GE's ongoing investments in its Brent Avenue facility is a direct reflection of both the skilled and dedicated workforce we have here, as well as our need to align our production capacity to quickly respond to the growing demands for our offshore products and services."

At January's GE Oil & Gas 2013 Annual Meeting in Florence, Italy, Christie told Rigzone that the Subsea Systems business plans to recruit "north of 2,000 people" by 2016.