ESNAAD, a wholly owned subsidiary of Adnoc, has embarked on fleet replacement because its current fleet of 25 different types of vessels is close to realising its amortisation period although it is well-maintained.

“But our concerns are sea-worthiness, safety of the people and oil installations and hence we have embarked on a seven-year plan to replace the existing fleet,” says Esnaad general manager Darwish A Al Qubaisi.
“This will entail acquiring 21 vessels at an estimated cost of nearly $200 million. It will be done in a phased manner. It could be chartered, built or purchased outright. Our aim is to renew the vessels. We are evaluating the purchases which could be either locally or overseas. The tendering is on for some of the vessels,” he says.
Esnaad currently known as Mussafah Offshore Supply Base (MOSB) is strategically located at the Industrial hub of Mussafah approximately 40 km by road from the city center of Abu Dhabi. Esnaad is not an acronym, as the Arabic name implies it means “support”.
It is a quality-focused organisation managing a strategic logistics support base providing comprehensive products and services to the oil and gas industry, while committed to the customers, employees, owners and the community
Esnaad was the result of a merger between Abu Dhabi Drilling Chemicals and Products (Addcap) and the National Marine Services Company (NMS) after an Emiri decree (No.2/2003) was issued.
Prior to the merger in 2002, the company’s marine operations division was the nucleus of the former National Marine Services Company (NMS), a company which was established under Emiri Decree issued in 1978 to own, manage, charter and broker specialised marine crafts. NMS had a proven record of having successfully provided world-class marine logistic support services to the needs of offshore oil and gas industry in the UAE and the neighboring countries over a period of 23 years. The list of clients served during the period encompasses Adma-Opco, Zadco, Bunduq, NPCC, Total-ABK, Udeco, Qatar Navigation, Saudi-Aramco, PGS, Fugro and Ocean Pakistan.
The base spreads over 148 hectares of fully developed land alongside the channel, with its state-of-the-art facilities. The company is well equipped to meet the challenge that lie ahead in supporting the oil and gas industry in the region operating in an era of modern technology.
Esnaad owns and operates a professionally logistic support base at Mussafah, Abu Dhabi, witch extends over 1.4 million sq m designed to meet the current and the future needs of target industry. The base operates 24 hours a day through the year and it provides with security round the-clock through an access control procedure and equipped with highly sophisticated fire detection and fire lighting system.
Esnaad is primarily a services company catering to the oil and gas industry and owns the strategically located Mussafah offshore supply base which extends over one million sq m to support onshore and offshore activities.
It also owns an automated grinding plant which produces mud chemicals and a blending plant to produce oil field drilling and production chemicals.
According to Qubaisi a major element of the merger was the synergy that will be created. “We are optimistic about the growth of the company through this natural merger of two companies in the same line of business. One is in marine and the other is in base and chemicals. Now we are equipped to provide a one-stop shop for varied services and total package solutions for the divergent needs of the oil and gas industry in the Gulf.”
Esnaad’s aim is to operate a modern integrated offshore supply base benchmarked for its excellence to provide comprehensive, innovative and efficient mud drilling services, material operations, marine logistics and waste disposal services as also oilfields drilling and production chemicals and other products.
To a large extent Esnaad has concentrated on providing services to all oil companies in Abu Dhabi and then companies in the UAE.
“Now we have expanded into neighbouring countries such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia and we are thinking of Iraq. We started business in Saudi Arabia about five years ago, taking contracts on and off and it is the same with Qatar,” he says.Although Iraq had oil and gas before Abu Dhabi, it is a now a virgin market with huge opportunities. For long it was a closed market but now I see it opening up its oil and gas industry.
“We would like to grab a share of the business but it depends on the political and economic factors. As a UAE-based company we see good prospects because the UAE has always taken a neutral stand,” Qubaisi continues.He says Esnaad faces strong competition in business. “We are a commercially-oriented, profit=making company. There are a lot of local and international companies in this business. But we compete with them,” he adds.