The oil industry’s top equipment and services suppliers are hawking vastly cheaper ways of designing and equipping subsea wells, aiming to slash the cost of offshore projects to compete with the faster-moving shale industry.

At the Offshore Technology Conference, the industry’s annual gathering of floating rig and subsea well suppliers, sales pitches this year are all about cost savings and faster time to first production. With U.S. crude priced under $50/bbl, offshore projects with their typically high costs and long-lead times are now borrowing from leaner shale in the competition for oil company investment.

Low oil prices have soured new exploration in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico (GoM), for instance, but production volumes there have remained strong due to the long lead times of these projects. GoM producers are expected to add 190,000 bbl/d this year to output now running about 1.76 MMbbl/d.

Tool and services companies are offering new technologies that can do several jobs, taking the place of multiple devices or highly paid consultants.

National Oilwell Varco Inc. exhibited software it touts as performing much like a drilling expert, sorting through vast amounts of data to find ways to speed production and reduce downtime.

The new software “takes actions a person would do and runs them automatically. It’s low cost and it’s simple,” said David Reid, National Oilwell Varco’s chief marketing officer.

Baker Hughes Inc. showed a new tool called DeepFrac that it said eliminates several steps now required to complete underwater wells. That saving pares the price of a well by up to 40%, speeding first production and lowering the breakeven cost for producers.

“This helps sharply cut some of the risk of drilling an offshore oil well and, we believe, sharply reduces costs for our customers,” said Jim Sessions, a vice president of technology at Baker Hughes.

Graham Hill, an executive vice president at KBR Inc., detailed the construction company’s plan for a cheaper floating production vessel, saying the new vessel fits producers’ tight budgets. KBR can hope to earn more by selling extra features.

“This is like ordering a Ford,” he said. “There’s a base package, and you can add extras.”

Richard Morrison, president of BP’s GoM region, said the industry has accepted that crude prices will probably stay low, meaning oil producers like BP must work with services providers to reduce the multibillion dollar cost of offshore projects.

“That breakeven point can’t come back to $80 a barrel, so I’ve got to figure out ways to work with my supplier over the long-term to keep that in check,” he said during an OTC presentation.

Morrison touted BP’s use of new seismic imaging technology that helped identify an additional 1Bbbl of “possible resources” at four of its U.S. GoM offshore fields. The technology enhances existing seismic images to find oil hidden beneath salt structures deep underground.

—Reuters