GTT providing internet service to Exxon offshore

Apr 13, 2022 News

Kaieteur News – The Guyana Telephone and Telegraph (GTT) Company recently achieved a milestone which it says other players in the region are yet to accomplish.
In February of this year, GTT completed the technical process to service offshore vessels with internet connectivity, a major highlight of the company’s decades old expertise. In a recent interview with Kaieteur News, the company’s Chief Operations Officer (COO) for Business Solutions, Mr. Orson Ferguson provided this newspaper with some of the impacts the oil sector has had on its operations.

GTT’s Chief Operations Officer for Business Solutions, Mr. Orson Ferguson

Ferguson said that while the oil sector came with better remuneration packages, therefore pressuring its skilled labour force, ExxonMobil also approached the company with great demands that no other entity ever requested or required. To date, GTT has completed two major projects for Exxon.
The company’s Business Solutions COO explained, “One was to help build 4G LTE network 120 miles offshore. Just imagine a customer coming to us and say hey we want to build a city, in effect it is a city right, we want to build a city in the middle of the ocean and we need 4G LTE service out there so that people who are going to be living out there can communicate with people around the world.”
Ferguson was happy to report that GTT was able to meet the requirement or fulfill its customer’s request. The Liza Unity Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) Vessel is currently being supplied with internet connectivity from GTT.
Damian Blackburn, the new Chief Executive Officer for the service provider noted that the process took about two years to come to life, starting in 2019. “We went with our network vendor on the design, it was installed actually in Singapore on the ship and when the ship was brought here we had to commission the systems…it’s the first time anybody in the region has done it actually,” Blackburn explained.
As it regards the second project, Ferguson said that the company is also providing services to ExxonMobil’s onshore facilities via fibre. He said, “They came to us and asked that we connect all of their facilities via fibre and so we were able to create a fiber range for them as well so all of their facilities onshore are connected to their base at Houston via a network designed specifically for them.”
According to GTT, Exxon has allowed the company to stretch its capabilities and also assisted in finding ways to design more complex solutions.