Oceaneering International has secured contracts worth more than US $40m with a subsidiary of offshore driller Transocean Ltd. to provide three subsea blowout preventer (BOP) control systems.

The contracts add more than $40m to Oceaneering’s Subsea Products backlog, said the subsea specialist contractor. The contracts are for discrete hydraulic systems that will be used on existing semisubmersible drilling rigs that Transocean is modifying to comply with the American Petroleum Institute’s recently issued standard API 53, which requires subsea BOPs with a single shear ram to be upgraded or replaced.

These systems will be manufactured at the Oceaneering Intervention Engineering facility in Houston, with deliveries anticipated in Q4 2013 and Q1 2014.

- Oceaneering reported record fourth quarter and annual earnings for the periods ended 31 December, 2012. In Q4 2012 its net income was US $80.6m on revenue of $780.9m, up from the Q4 2011 figures of $58.3m and $574.2m respectively. For the full year 2012, it reported net income of $289m on revenue of $2.8 Bn, again up on the equivalent 2011 figures of $235.7m and $2.2 Bn.

M. Kevin McEvoy, President and CEO, said: “Our record annual earnings of $289m were largely attributable to our global focus on deepwater and subsea completion activity. Each of our five operating business segments attained higher income than in 2011. We achieved record ROV operating income for the ninth consecutive year on higher demand to provide drill support and vessel-based services, notably offshore Africa and in the US Gulf of Mexico, and expansion of our fleet.”

Subsea products backlog at the end of 2012 was $681m, up 78% from $382m at the end of 2011.