MTEM

MTEM provides land and marine surveys to oil companies and develops electromagnetic methods to detect sub-sea and underground hydrocarbons.

In 2001 Anton Ziolkowski, Bruce Hobbs and David Wright of the University of Edinburgh invented a new electromagnetic method to detect sub-sea and underground hydrocarbons. In 2003 they founded MTEM Ltd. to develop the technology and provide land and marine surveys to oil companies. In November 2004 MTEM Ltd. was launched from the University of Edinburgh with £7.4M of funding from three equal investors: HitecVision, Energy Ventures, and Scottish Equity Partners. MTEM Ltd. developed and built systems to perform land and marine transient electromagnetic surveys that can identify hydrocarbons before drilling, thus reducing the risk of drilling “dry” wells and saving millions of dollars per well. In June 2007 Petroleum Geo-Services (PGS) bought MTEM Ltd. for $275M. The University of Edinburgh’s share of the sale was £8.6M, of which £2.6M funded 164 PhD studentships. PGS continues to develop the technology.