Rowan Parts with Land Drilling Division

- Rowan Parts with Land Drilling Division

Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Rowan Companies Inc.

Rowan has entered into a purchase and sale agreement (the "Agreement") with Ensign United States Drilling (S.W.) Inc., a subsidiary of Ensign Energy Services Inc.("Ensign"), to sell Rowan's land drilling division for $510 million in cash, plus working capital of approximately $30 million. The Agreement is subject only to regulatory approval, which the Company expects to obtain within 60 days.

Matt Ralls, President and Chief Executive Officer, commented, "We are pleased to enter into this agreement with Ensign, as we continue to execute our stated strategy to separate non-core businesses. We expect that our after-tax proceeds, estimated at approximately $370 million, will be redeployed into our offshore drilling business and recently announced deepwater expansion. We believe our high-specification land rig fleet will be a strong addition to Ensign's global fleet of over 300 land rigs, and that our land division employees will have significant opportunities with such a large and well-respected operation. I want to personally thank all of the land division employees for their dedication and service over the years as part of the Rowan family, and wish them the best in their careers with Ensign."

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Toyota Announces Temporary Shutdown of All North American Factories "Inevitable" (TM)

Toyota Announces Temporary Shutdown of All North American Factories "Inevitable" (TM)




Toyota Motor Co (NYSE:TM) announced earlier today that they will have to close down all of their North American factories by the end of this month due to a parts shortage caused by the damage from the Japanese earthquake and tsunami.

The temporary shutdown of the company's 13 factories in North America is inevitable, the company said. How long the production stoppage will last is unknown. 25,000 workers will be affected, but no layoffs are expected.

The factories have been using parts from their inventories and those that were shipped before the disaster, but those supplies are running out.

Spokesman Mike Goss said, "We're going to get to a point this month where that gap in the pipeline starts to show up. So we'll have to suspend production for a while,"

Toyota gets about 15% of the parts for cars and trucks built in North America from Japan, "but still you have to have them all to build the vehicles," Goss said.

Shares of Toyota Motor are trading down 1.29% at $79.47.