Norway’s GGS says Iran survey attracts US interest

February 25, 2009

OSLO, Feb 25 (Reuters) -Norwegian seismic surveyor Global Geo Services (GGS) (GGS.OL), a supplier to the oil and gas industry, said on Wednesday a U.S.-based energy firm had shown interest in its survey offshore Iran.

Knut Øversjøen. Photo: André Clark Utvik.

Chief Executive Knut Oversjøn told a news conference on GGS’s fourth-quarter results that the company was discussing a potential sale of its “PC 2000” Iran study with “a couple of” companies, including one U.S.-based group. “That would have been unthinkable just six months ago,” Oversjøn said.

U.S. President Barack Obama has said he is ready to deal directly with Iran, something his predecessor rejected, and companies have been subject to sanctions on trade with Iran.

The survey contains 100,000 kilometres of two-dimensional seismic and 3,250 square kilometres of 3D seismic data from the Iranian part of the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman, GGS said.

GGS has rights to data until 2012, but has written down most of the value of the survey on its books because of low interest from western firms in recent years. Oversjøn said GGS sold data from the survey worth around $4 million in 2008 and nothing in the fourth quarter.

Source: Reuters.com. (Reporting by Joergen Frich; Writing by Richard Solem; Editing by David Holmes)

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