By Yemie Adeoye & Nnenna Ezeah
BUT for the passage of the Nigerian Content Act in 2010, not a few indigenous companies providing various services in the oil and gas sector would have gone under.

By virtue of the law, Nigerian service companies have continued to venture into spheres hitherto deemed unachievable.

This was the position of the Managing Director, Global Oceon Engineers, an indigenous offshore engineering design company, Mr. Seun Faluyi,  in an exclusive chat with Vanguard in Lagos recently.

According to him, Nigerian indigenous companies were now taking full advantage of the law by delving into tougher areas like offshore drills and engineering design just like Oceon.

“What Global Oceon does is not just engineering design, which is general. Very early, we decided to focus and establish a niche for ourselves, and after a lot of soul-searching and brain storming sessions, we decided that we will be an offshore engineering company, though we will not decline working onshore.

The reason we choose offshore was because offshore engineering is dominated by expatriates in international engineering companies and going offshore is something companies in Nigeria are beginning to consider. There is a problem with security onshore, and it was more and more logistics issues, but the offshore is an area that is still virgin.

“Although still new, it seems to be offering more returns. But we didn’t have Nigerians experienced in offshore engineering, so we saw it as an area where we will not have so much competition domestically but we will have fierce competition internationally.

But we said we will not be intimidated by that, what it meant is that this is an opportunity to prove that Nigerians can do something in offshore engineering and compete with international companies.”

Faluyi noted that focusing on offshore engineering designs received a boost when the federal government eventually enacted the Nigerian Content law, which has seen the company and many others in the oil services sub-sector getting contracts without the usual fuss associated with them previously.

With regard to challenges, he said that market acceptance by the oil producing companies is a major factor affecting indigenous service companies. This, he said, is because the foreign companies were yet to come to terms with the fact that Nigerian companies do exist and are capable of carrying out these jobs professionally to meet international standards.

“We need to get people because they don’t teach offshore engineering in Nigeria, so we have to teach it ourselves. We spend a lot of effort trying to get good people. It’s about getting and maintaining the proper standard. We do not manage or try to cut corners, as this can result in very costly mistakes.