Seatrium and TCOMS in new research collaboration agreement

Master research collaboration agreement to establish Seatrium-TCOMS Ocean Lab was signed by (L to R) Chris Ong, CEO of Seatrium, and Professor Chan Eng Soon, CEO of TCOMS. The signing was witnessed by Singapore's Minister of State for Trade and Industry Ms Low Yen Ling (second row, center), Mark Gainsborough, Chairman of Seatrium (second row, left), and Frederick Chew, CEO of A*STAR (second row, right).

Seatrium Limited, the new Singapore-based player formed by the merger of Sembcorp Marine and Keppel Offshore & Marine (Keppel O&M), is up and running. In a signal of where it sees the future, it has just reached an agreement with the Technology Center for Offshore and Marine, Singapore (TCOMS) to establish the Seatrium-TCOMS Ocean Lab.

With this agreement, Seatrium and TCOMS will jointly pursue five main research thrusts centered on offshore renewable energy such as floating offshore wind systems; cleaner oil and gas solutions including smart floating production platforms; smart marine systems such as autonomous vessels and green ships; new energy solutions including ammonia (NH3), hydrogen (H2) and carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS); as well as digitalization & data analytics for enhanced predictability and reliability of ocean systems and its infrastructure.

The agreement builds on joint projects conducted over the past five years between TCOMS and Seatrium’s predecessor companies, ranging from the digital twinning of autonomous tugs and offshore energy systems to the design evolution and validation of future offshore wind platforms and marine infrastructure.

Some of the projects made use of the TCOMS ocean basin facility which can recreate extreme ocean conditions that may be faced by ocean systems and infrastructure across their asset lifecycle. Information derived from numerical simulations and physical tests in the ocean basin enable the industry’s designers and TCOMS’ scientists to validate how the ocean systems will perform. They will also use this knowledge to enhance their system’s field performance, through technologies such as digital twinning enabled by smart sensing, artificial intelligence and data analytics.

Chris Ong, CEO of Seatrium, said, “We are glad to partner with a world class research center like TCOMS to advance our capabilities in the area of offshore renewables, new energy and cleaner solutions for the offshore, marine and energy industries. This collaboration will allow us to accelerate our strategic growth into the renewable and clean energy segments and further diversify our business portfolio into new areas of offshore renewables, electrification, gas value chain as well as carbon capture and storage solutions. Co-innovation by talents in both organizations will enable testing, simulations, digital twinning and analysis to be performed in this world class ocean basin facility. We look forward to pushing new boundaries of engineering excellence to create transformative and sustainable offshore, marine and energy solutions for a greener future.”

Professor Chan Eng Soon, CEO of TCOMS, said, “We are delighted to have the opportunity to support Seatrium in their transformative journey to develop innovative engineering solutions for the offshore, marine and new energy industries, especially in advancing the design and operational capabilities of ocean systems deployed in challenging marine environments. With advanced capabilities such as cyber- physical modeling and simulation, TCOMS researchers and scientists work closely with our industry partners to co-create solutions and stress-test solutions for performance, safety and sustainability. Together with Seatrium, we will also seek to nurture Singapore’s engineering talent, particularly our younger generation of engineers, to create and build future ocean systems and infrastructure.”