(EnergyAsia, February 8, Friday) — UK-based Infield has predicted that companies will invest a total of US$106 billion on the world subsea market over the next five years, including drilling and completion, subsea equipment and SURF pipelines and control lines. This forecast spend represents a 65% increase on the previous five years to 2007.

In its latest “Global Perspectives Subsea Market Update”, Infield said there are “considerable” regional variations within this global increase.

Africa will see an increase to US$31 billion from US$17.5 billion, while Asia and Australasia will report increases from US$3.7 billion to US$16.8 billion.
In Europe and North America, the expected increase is 20% to US$39.7 billion and Latin America will experience a 69% increase to US$17.6 billion.

The report said this will be “a great year” for tree manufacturers with 263 trees expected to be ordered for Africa. Projects like Pazflor, Plutao/Saturno, Block 15, Usan and Bonga Southwest are driving this forecast. Africa, the Americas and Europe are dominating the subsea tree award market.

The report for 2008 contains the following information and analysis:

Global, Regional and Country Forecasts; Capex by actual year of spend; Equipment Type Forecasts; Detail Analysis by Subsea Equipment – Drilling & Completions – Pipelines & Control Lines; Order Year Analysis to 2012 and Prospectivity Analysis.

The report also looks at the supply and demand issues within the industry, providing comparative analysis of the conventional and surf markets with forecast development costs of major projects.

The offshore market overview provides analysis of commodity pricing, price versus activity levels analysis, geopolitical overview including discussions on operator types, including the National Oil Companies. Market Potential is examined by project, equipment, reserves and production, identifying the trends by region, water depth, operator, field ownership and development type.

The report looks at recent important activity and analyses all known and future prospects over a 10 year window of 2003 to 2012.