HAMILTON, Bermuda, July 11, 2007 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- Seadrill has on July 10, 2007 completed a private placement of a total of 7 million new shares to a subscription price of NOK127.00 per share. Gross proceeds from the equity issue amounted to NOK889 million (equivalent to approximately U.S. $153 million). The total number of shares outstanding after the issue will be 399,133,216.
The share issue was significantly oversubscribed.
Given the latest contract development only two of the Company's newbuild deepwater units are available for assignments before 2010. There are today several interesting prospects for these units. Based on good progress in securing contracts for its available units, the tightening yard slot situation, pressure on building prices and the strong underlying fundamentals, Seadrill has, as earlier reported, entered into discussions with major yards regarding further newbuilds. The new equity is targeted at further investments in deepwater newbuilds.
Hemen Holding Limited, a company indirectly controlled by Seadrill's chairman, John Fredriksen, underwrote the whole issue and was allocated a total of 1.2 million shares. No compensation was paid for the underwriting. Hemen Holding Limited will after this control a total of 135,747,583 shares constituting 34.1 percent of the issued share capital.
The share issue was managed by Carnegie ASA, Fearnley Fonds ASA and Dahlman Rose & Co.
Seadrill Limited
Hamilton, Bermuda
July 11, 2007