DOLPHIN DRILLING: Built for Further Growth
Among the longest-established drilling contractors operating globally, Dolphin Drilling has spent more than six decades delivering safe, reliable and efficient operations in some of the industry’s most demanding environments. CEO Michael Boyd explains how formidable accumulated experience, a substantially enlarged backlog and an increasingly flexible approach to fleet management have combined to re-establish the business as a genuine platform for further growth.
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Interview with Michael Boyd, CEO
For more than 60 years, Dolphin Drilling has operated in some of the world’s most demanding offshore environments. Headquartered in Aberdeen and listed in Oslo, the company specialises in harsh-environment, mid-water and deep-water semi-submersible drilling rigs, supplying assets and associated services to oil and gas operators across an extensive international footprint.
“The backbone of the company has been the North Sea,” explains CEO Michael Boyd, “but we have experience in all geographies.”
Recent assignments have taken Dolphin from India to the North Sea, with upcoming work in Spain, while West Africa and Mexico number among a litany of previous destinations in a history which has seen the business work with many of the world’s foremost energy companies.
ESTABLISHING THE PLATFORM
Boyd commenced his tenure as CEO in December 2025, after more than 13 years with Dolphin Drilling. His wider industry career exceeds two decades, beginning in technical roles before progressing through offshore engineering, management, sales and business development. His priority on taking up the top job was deliberately uncomplicated, and both his own experience and Dolphin’s formidable institutional knowledge are proving crucial in a market which he readily admits has been anything but straightforward.
“Our objective for the year has been to re-establish Dolphin Drilling as a platform for growth,” Boyd explains. “That has meant that we have had to add contract backlog to give us stability, reduce some structural costs from within the business and continue to deliver our safe and efficient operations.”
The results stand as testament to the efficacy of this approach. At the end of June, Dolphin reported US$557 million in firm contract backlog, with a further $446 million represented by options. First-half revenue stood at $89.6 million, EBITDA rose approximately 47% year-on-year to $15.3 million, and cash had increased to $55.1 million from $30.5 million at the end of 2025.
“For this year, it was very much: let’s get the stability in place, get the building blocks there to build on,” Boyd relays. “And that is what we have done.”
Much of that increased visibility has come through major multi-year awards, Boyd states. Known industry-wide as a true workhorse, Paul B. Loyd Jr. has formed part of the Dolphin Drilling fleet since 2024 and boasts more than 35 years of North Sea experience. It is now contracted into 2030 following a new Harbour Energy agreement, while Borgland Dolphin has secured work extending into 2031.
“The second quarter marks a structural change in Dolphin Drilling’s position and further demonstrates our ability to deliver on our goals and objectives, with strong operational performance, good cost discipline and excellent contract backlog all evident,” Boyd comments. “The two multi-year awards secured for Paul B. Loyd Jr. and Borgland Dolphin transform our revenue outlook, extending contracted backlog across the latter half of the decade.”
BACKLOG AT THE FOREFRONT
Boyd places operational performance alongside commercial success as one of Dolphin’s central strengths – backlog alone, he notes, is of limited worth if a rig cannot deliver once on contract. “We have very strong safety and operational performance that we consistently deliver across the fleet to our clients,” he says. “We have got a high uptime percentage – Paul B. Loyd Jr. achieved 99.8% uptime, for example, while Blackford Dolphin recorded 90.2% – which means that the rig is productive for the majority of the time that it is on contract.”
Deep-water harsh-environment rig Blackford also passed the milestone of 1,000 days without a lost-time injury, Boyd reveals. “The first objective for the company is to deliver safe operations. The operational performance has been very good, against what remains a testing North Sea environment.
“We’ve had to work quite hard to get backlog on the rigs,” Boyd admits. “It has been a tough environment, particularly in the North Sea where our headquarters is, given the uncertainty in the oil and gas sector within the UK.” Boyd regards Dolphin’s success in adding UK backlog in the face of such headwinds as clear evidence both of the company’s competitiveness and of the enduring indispensability of experienced offshore contractors.
Developments surrounding Blackford Dolphin provide perhaps the clearest illustration yet of Dolphin’s evolving approach to growth. Following the completion of work for Oil India, Dolphin announced in late October an agreement to sell Blackford Dolphin to SPM Energy Shipping FZCO. That transaction does not, however, end Dolphin’s involvement with the rig: alongside the sale, the parties agreed a framework under which Dolphin may manage future drilling contracts for Blackford and at least one additional semi-submersible unit.
“Growth is absolutely the objective,” Boyd emphasises. “We may manage assets on behalf of others, we may own more assets. Nothing is off the table really. It is whatever gives our shareholders the best return.”
This increasingly flexible structure reduces Dolphin’s exposure to operating costs and removes the capital expenditure associated with Blackford’s forthcoming class renewal, while preserving the prospect of management-fee income and allowing the company to deploy its accumulated operating expertise across additional assets. In turn, it aligns neatly with Boyd’s broader conception of Dolphin as an operating platform whose value resides not solely in steel and machinery, but in the hard-won knowledge required to run complex offshore assets safely, efficiently and repeatedly.
For Boyd, sustainable growth depends not only on assets and contracts but also on developing the next generation of industry talent.
INVESTING IN THE FUTURE
Dolphin Drilling has undergone substantial change over six decades of operations: passing through different ownership structures, operating fleets considerably larger than today’s and working across virtually every major offshore region. “At Dolphin Drilling, we believe in hands-on experience shaping the future workforce,” Boyd expresses, turning his attention from six decades of accumulated expertise to the generations upon whom the next chapter of Dolphin’s history will depend.
“We’ve proudly participated in the Foundation Apprenticeship programme, which provides senior-phase secondary school pupils with a work-based learning opportunity and real-world experience alongside their studies.” The aim, Boyd says, is to help bridge the stubborn gulf between education and young professionals securing meaningful employment, by supporting initiatives capable of cultivating the industry’s next generation of talent.
“We are committed to helping young people realise their potential and discover the exciting opportunities within the energy sector,” Boyd noted of Dolphin Drilling’s support for the Young Person’s Guarantee, joining organisations across Scotland in committing to create the strongest possible opportunities for young people. “Supporting the next generation is key to building a vibrant and sustainable future for all.”
This position will be critical, Boyd argues, to augmenting still further the deep pool of experience already resident within Dolphin Drilling, and to converting that accumulated knowledge into yet greater future potential. “We have got some great people here – a very solid, experienced team,” he says. “I genuinely believe we can add to that team and grow the company using the fundamentals that we have here: the long operating history, the knowledge and experience in how to do things.”
2026 has therefore been very much a year in which stability came first, furnishing the foundations upon which loftier ambitions can be realised in the months and years ahead. “This is really about Dolphin Drilling as a platform for growth,” Boyd concludes. “We’ve added backlog to the company, we’ve reduced the structural cost, and we continue to deliver safe and efficient operations.
“We see ourselves as a platform for growth for the future.”