18 jobs saved as Johnston Carmichael oversees sale of Mountwest Petroleum Engineering

Staff at an Arbroath-based oil and gas services firm have been saved from redundancy after Mountwest Petroleum Engineering Ltd (MPEL) was bought out of administration last week, administrators Johnston Carmichael have announced.

MPEL was placed in administration on Friday, April 28, 2017 after suffering the effects of the prolonged downturn in the North Sea, and Gordon MacLure and Ewen Alexander of JC were appointed as its Joint Administrators.

The business and assets of MPEL were then sold by the Joint Administrators to Mountwest Petroleum Ltd (MPE) on the same day, retaining 18 members of staff.

The company traded from premises at Sir William Smith Road, Kirkton Industrial Estate, Arbroath and provided licensed connection repairs and manufacturing services to the oil and gas industry including VAM and API threading services. It will continue to trade from the same address following the deal.

MPE will now be operated by Independent Oil Tools Group, a subsidiary of Petrolia SE.

Richard Bathgate, restructuring director at Johnston Carmichael, said: “Like many companies MPEL has suffered over recent years from the downturn in the oil industry and had accumulated significant liabilities.

“However being able to move rapidly with the sale of the business was a critical element in preventing 18 people being made redundant from their jobs, and avoiding the knock-on effects of that on the local economy.”