What do you do when the Norwich-based company that you work for is bought out and operations are moved hundreds of miles away… to Aberdeen” Colleagues Jonathan Soar, Bob MacMillan and John Doherty decided to jump ship and set up their own company. And so Oceanteam 2000 (trading as Ot2K) was born.
This Great Yarmouth firm, established in 1999, provides diving and surveying services to the offshore oil and gas industries. “We basically work for everyone in the North Sea except BP and Shell,” says Isabel Day, who became MD last September.
Its holding company, GDV Subsea, is based in Norway, but all operations are managed from Britain. The company recently raised £50m from investors to build its own three vessels and is planning to float on the Oslo stock exchange (Oslo Børs) within the next two years. Sales have grown 206 per cent a year from £700,000 in 2004 to £20.1m in 2007.
