International oil services, engineering and construction company Aker Solutions has decided to cultivate its core businesses by creating three separate companies.

The new strategic direction, which will be announced at the company's capital markets day in Oslo today, is the conclusion of a strategy process initiated by the company's board in second quarter 2009.

"We have listened carefully to feedback from our customers and investors and analyzed how we should position ourselves to meet their expectations," said Øyvind Eriksen, executive chairman of Aker Solutions.

"Their feedback is consistent. Our company enjoys strong positions in several market segments. However, to further accelerate our growth, we should be more focused, more flexible in our approach to customer specific requirements, and much more transparent," he said.

Leading on from this, the next step is to cultivate the current Aker Solutions business into three separate companies:

• The future Aker Solutions will be a fully-fledged provider of engineering, technologies, solutions and services for the upstream oil and gas industry. Its range of offerings will include deepwater drilling technologies, subsea oil and gas production systems, well services, mooring and offloading systems, wellstream processing technologies, as well as life-of-field solutions through its maintenance, modification and operations business.

• Aker Contractors will be a specialized EPC (engineering, procurement and construction) company with a strong position in the North Sea field development market, key positions in selected international target regions, and a strong offering of distinct offshore products with a global market. The new company will continue to target offshore and onshore EPC field development projects with the ambition to maintain its strong position in the North Sea and further grow its international presence

• Process & Construction International, a leading global supplier of engineering and construction services to onshore industry segments.

Growth Potential
Aker Solutions said it expects that the restructuring will unleash energy and drive in each of the new, streamlined businesses and ultimately contribute to accelerate growth.

The company expects that annual average growth in the years 2011-2015 could be in the 9-15% range, partly as a result of growing markets, growing market shares and revenues from businesses acquired in the period.

"This will of course not happen by itself. All our current businesses must work persistently to improve operations and customer satisfaction. Being second best is simply not good enough for any part of Aker Solutions," Eriksen said.

Next Steps
With the board's resolution on strategic direction, preparation will now start. On top of the Board's agenda is the appointment of CEOs for Aker Solutions and the new entity Aker Contractors.

The work that will lead to legal and financial separation of Aker Contractors will continue in the first half of 2011 and will be presented to the General Meeting for final resolution. The plan is to separate Aker Contractors from Aker Solutions through a share dividend to Aker Solutions shareholders. By that Aker Solutions' leading shareholder Aker Holding will maintain its current shareholding in both Aker Solutions and Aker Contractors.

Relevant amendments will be proposed to the agreement between Aker Holding's shareholders. The planned restructuring will not involve related party transactions between Aker Solutions' direct or indirect owners.