Sharjah-based oilfield services company Petrofac says UAE operations are continuing, despite laying off 180 people after a multibillion-dollar Dutch offshore wind contract was cancelled as the firm struggles with mounting debts.
“Delivery of Petrofac’s operations across its UAE project portfolio are continuing as normal,” a company representative told The National on Monday.
“Petrofac is focused on preserving value, operational capability and ongoing delivery across the group’s operating and trading entities while options are being advanced to underpin their long-term future.”
About 180 people in the UAE were laid off after the Netherlands-based electricity grid operator TenneT cancelled Petrofac’s contract for the development of a two-gigawatt offshore wind project in the North Sea.
The contract, which Petrofac won in 2023 alongside Japan's Hitachi, was worth €13 billion ($15 billion) and the company's largest award to date.
However, in October TenneT cancelled a portion of the award, plunging Petrofac into administration.
The company has debts amounting to about $4 billion, according to a judgment from July in a case brought by some creditors. Petrofac has liabilities of about $909 million to secured creditors and $3 billion to unsecured creditors.
The latest crisis is a culmination of several events, including the $105 million fine imposed by the UK Serious Fraud Office in 2021 against the company on charges of bribery.
Petrofac was in the process of a court-ordered restructuring plan this year, before the cancellation of the Dutch c
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