Key Points
- Subsea7 and Saipem want to merge into “Saipem7”, with roughly €43 billion in orders and strong exposure to Brazil’s deepwater fields.
- Big clients such as Petrobras, ExxonMobil and TotalEnergies fear one giant supplier will gain too much leverage over prices, timing and contract terms.
- Brazil’s antitrust authority Cade is now the referee, deciding whether scale will bring efficiency or quietly weaken competition in a strategic sector.
Brazil’s antitrust saga over the planned merger of Subsea7 and Saipem is more than a technical case about ships and pipelines.
It is a fight over who sets the terms for Brazil’s next generation of deepwater oil projects: global contractors or the companies, taxpayers and workers who pay the bill.
On the surface, the deal looks clean. Subsea7 and Saipem want to fuse into “Saipem7”, a subsea engineering group with roughly €43 billion in orders, around €21 billion in annual revenue and more than €2 billion in core earnings.
They promise about €300 million a year in savings by sharing fleets, engineers and back-office functions, and say that scale will help deliver complex projects more efficiently.
The trouble starts in Brazil’s deepwater segment, where only a handful of firms can install the webs of umbilicals, risers and flexible lines that connect seabed wells to floating platforms.
In this SURF niche, big clients fear that swapping two competitors for one giant will tilt bargaining power sharply toward the contractor side.
Brazil’s oil industry association, which represents Petrobras, Shell, ExxonMobil and TotalEnergies, has warned that Saipem7 could become strong enough to demand extra payments, slow work and press operators into long exclusive contracts.
TotalEnergies sent its own study saying the merged group would control eight of the world’s 12 most specialised SURF vessels, including ships able to work in ultra-deep water or harsh seas. When one supplier owns most of that capacity, delays or price hikes become much harder to resist.
Cade, the Brazilian antitrust authority, has therefore asked both companies for more data and has consulted foreign regulators, including in the United Kingdom, which has already cleared the deal.
The watchdog can approve the merger, impose conditions such as asset sales or access commitments, or move to block key parts of the transaction in Brazil.
For expats and foreign investors, this is a clear test of Brazil’s model. The country needs foreign capital and technology to keep offshore oil flowing and to prepare for offshore wind.
But if critical infrastructure ends up in the hands of a tiny global club, Brazil’s room to negotiate fair prices, deadlines and local content could quietly shrink for years.