ADES Books $98 Million in Jack-Up Work Offshore Angola and Indonesia

ADES Holding has lined up roughly $98 million in new offshore drilling work, split between a one-year, $52 million contract extension for the Shelf Drilling Tenacious jack-up offshore Angola and a fresh 406-day contract worth $46.17 million for the Shelf Drilling Perseverance in Indonesia.

The company announced the Angola award on October 27. Valued at approximately $52 million (SAR 195 million), the extension was secured through the exercise of an existing option and kicks in immediately after the rig's current contract, which had been scheduled to expire in the first quarter of 2027.

It's the second vote of confidence in the rig off West Africa in quick succession. The Shelf Drilling Tenacious previously secured an extension with CABGOC — Chevron's Angolan subsidiary — in August 2025, and this latest option exercise stretches the rig's drilling campaign offshore Angola by another year.

What kind of rig is working offshore Angola?

The Tenacious is a Baker Marine Pacific 375 jack-up, built in 2007 and last upgraded in 2022. It can operate in water depths up to 375 feet (114.3 metres) and drill to 30,000 feet (9,144 metres). The unit berths 150 people.

Takeaway: a nearly two-decade-old rig, refreshed in 2022, is still pulling premium-length contracts in Angolan waters.

What does the Indonesia award cover?

Separately, ADES signed a new contract with PT Pertamina Hulu Mahakam (PHM) for the Shelf Drilling Perseverance jack-up in Indonesia. The numbers break down like this:

• Firm period: 406 days
• Optional period: an additional 30 days
• Total backlog, firm plus optional: an estimated $46.17 million (SAR 173.14 million), including mobilization and demobilization fees

The Perseverance is a Friede & Goldman JU-2000E 400-foot jack-up drilling unit. Operations are expected to begin around the end of December 2026, once the rig wraps its current short-term campaign in the region.

The deal is a first in more ways than one. ADES described the Indonesia award as the beginning of a new contractual relationship with PHM, expanding the drilling contractor's customer base in Southeast Asia.

Takeaway: ADES has turned a one-off rig assignment into a foothold with one of Indonesia's key upstream players.

How does this fit the bigger fleet picture?

Both announcements land less than a year into ADES' ownership of Shelf Drilling. The company completed its acquisition of Shelf Drilling in November 2025, combining the two businesses into a fleet of more than 80 offshore jack-up rigs — over 45 of them premium units.

That scale is the strategic point. Jack-up demand in West Africa and Southeast Asia has been tightening as national oil companies and majors lock in rigs years ahead of program start dates, and a combined ADES-Shelf fleet gives the contractor coverage across both basins. The Angola work anchors the contractor in a Chevron-operated campaign; the Mahakam award puts it inside Pertamina's domestic portfolio.

For the rigs themselves, the schedule is effectively seamless. The Tenacious rolls straight from its current contract into the one-year option, and the Perseverance moves from its short-term regional campaign into the PHM job at the end of December 2026 — no idle gap, no repositioning risk beyond the stated mobilization and demobilization fees already priced into the backlog.

Takeaway: two rigs, two basins, and roughly $98 million added to a backlog that now stretches toward the end of 2027.

What to watch

The watch items are calendar-driven. On the Angola side, look for any further option exercises on the Tenacious as the new term progresses under CABGOC. In Indonesia, the startup itself — around end-December 2026 — is the milestone, along with whether PHM converts the 30-day option into firm work and whether the new relationship produces follow-on tenders for other units in the combined 80-plus rig fleet.