Rig owners placed orders for five new jackup drilling rigs over the course of the first quarter of 2004. If just one more jackup is added to the order book before the end of the year, the 2004 jackup order total will match the highest number reached in the last seven years (six in 1997), while just two more orders would match the highest number of jackups ordered in a single year since 1984. A combination of speculative newbuilding, inventive shipyard incentives and to a lesser extent the need for fleet modernization are driving rig owners to embark on somewhat ambitious jackup building programs. Fleet replacement has not entered into the equation, yet. The closest a rig owner has come to a legitimate "fleet replacement" order was Ensco International's recent deal with Keppel FELS to build jackup ENSCO 107. As partial payment for the new rig, Ensco traded Keppel two platform rigs and an aging jackup, ENSCO 55. Keppel turned around and sold the rigs to a third-party, keeping the units in the active fleet. Ensco terms the decision to order jackup ESNCO 107 another step in its continuing fleet renewal program. Jackup ENSCO 55 was Ensco's one remaining Friede & Goldman L-780 Mod I! unit that had not been upgraded as part of the company's overall fleet enhancement program.
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