Patterson-UTI Energy, Inc. provides drilling and completion services to oil and natural gas exploration and production companies in the United States and other select countries.
The company offers services, including contract drilling services, integrated well completion services and directional drilling services in the United States, and specialized drill bit solutions in the United States, the Middle East, and many other regions around the world.
Segments
The company operates through three...
Patterson-UTI Energy, Inc. provides drilling and completion services to oil and natural gas exploration and production companies in the United States and other select countries.
The company offers services, including contract drilling services, integrated well completion services and directional drilling services in the United States, and specialized drill bit solutions in the United States, the Middle East, and many other regions around the world.
Segments
The company operates through three segments: Drilling services, Completion services, and Drilling products.
Drilling Services
The company’s contract drilling business operates in the continental United States and internationally in Colombia and Ecuador and, from time to time, it pursues contract drilling opportunities in other select markets. It also provides a comprehensive suite of directional drilling services in most major producing onshore oil and natural gas basins in the United States, and it provides services that improve the statistical accuracy of wellbore placement for directional and horizontal wells. The company also services and re-certify equipment for drilling contractors, and it provides electrical controls and automation to the energy, marine and mining industries, in North America and other select markets.
Completion Services
The company’s well completion services business consists of services for hydraulic fracturing, wireline and pumping, completion support, and cementing. It also includes its power solutions natural gas fueling business and its proppant last mile logistics and storage business. The company’s completion services business operates in several of the most active basins in the continental United States, including the Permian, the Marcellus Shale/Utica, the Eagle Ford, Mid-Continental, Haynesville, and the Bakken/Rockies.
Drilling Products
The company serves the energy and mining markets by manufacturing and distributing drill bits throughout North America and internationally in over 30 countries. Its drilling equipment is used in oil and natural gas exploration and production and in mining operations. The company has manufacturing, and repair facilities located in Fort Worth, Texas, Leduc, Alberta and Saudi Arabia and repair facilities located in Argentina, Colombia, and Oman.
Drilling Services Operations
The company provides its contract drilling services to oil and natural gas operators in the United States, Colombia and Ecuador. As of December 31, 2024, it had 152 marketed land-based drilling rigs.
All of these drilling rigs are electric rigs. An electric rig converts the power from its diesel or natural gas engines into electricity to power the rig. The U.S. land rig industry has in recent years referred to certain high specification rigs as ‘super-spec’ rigs, which it considers to be at least a 1,500 horsepower, AC-powered rig that has at least a 750,000-pound hookload, a 7,500-psi circulating system, and is pad-capable. Due to evolving customer preferences, it refers to certain premium rigs as Tier-1, super-spec rigs, which it considers as being a super-spec rig that also has a third mud pump and raised drawworks that allows for more clearance underneath the rig floor. As of December 31, 2024, the company had 135 Tier-1, super-spec rigs.
The company’s APEX rigs are AC-powered electric rigs with high pressure mud systems, walking systems and increased hookload capacity. The company’s contract drilling operations depend on the availability of drill pipe, replacement parts and other related rig equipment, fuel and other materials and qualified personnel. Some of these have been in short supply from time to time.
The company performs repair and/or upgrade work to its drilling rig equipment at its yard facilities located in Texas, Oklahoma, Wyoming, Colorado, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and internationally in Colombia.
Drilling Contracts — Most of the company’s drilling contracts are with established customers on a competitive bid or negotiated basis. The company’s bid for each job depends upon location, equipment to be used, estimated risks involved, estimated duration of the job, availability of drilling rigs and other factors particular to each proposed contract. Its drilling contracts are generally either on a well-to-well basis or a term basis. Well-to-well contracts are generally short-term in nature and cover the drilling of a single well or a series of wells. Term contracts are entered into for a specified period of time (it defines term contracts as contracts with a duration of six months or more) or for a specified number of wells.
Rig Fleet Evaluation: On a periodic basis, the company evaluates its fleet of drilling rigs for marketability based on the condition of inactive rigs, expenditures that would be necessary to bring inactive rigs to working condition and the expected demand for drilling services by rig type. The components comprising rigs that will no longer be marketed are evaluated, and those components with continuing utility to its other marketed rigs are transferred to other rigs or to its yards to be used as spare equipment. The remaining components of these rigs are retired. During the third quarter of 2024, the company identified 42 legacy, non-Tier-1 super-spec drilling rigs and related equipment to be abandoned.
Drilling Technology — The company continues to enhance the technology offerings that can be used with its drilling operations. The company’s proprietary operating system for APEX drilling rigs, Cortex, can allow for the deployment of custom applications for rig performance, control and optimization. For instance, its GenAssist application can employ smart engine logic turning engines on and off to reduce fuel consumption and emissions. The company’s Cortex Key edge server can connect to various systems at the well site, streaming large data sets and providing a single, high-speed data aggregation source. Its EcoCell lithium battery hybrid energy management system is capable of utilizing stored energy to help reduce fuel consumption and emissions.
Directional Drilling — The company generally utilize its own proprietary downhole motors and equipment to provide a comprehensive suite of directional drilling services, including directional drilling, measurement-while-drilling (MWD) and supply and rental of downhole performance motors, such as its Mpact drilling motors, and MWD equipment, such as its Mpower MWD systems. The company’s customers primarily consist of oil and natural gas operators in the United States.
Wellbore Placement Optimization Services — The company provides software and services used to improve the accuracy of directional and horizontal wellbores, wellbore quality, and on-bottom ROP (rate of penetration). Its MWD Survey FDIR (fault detection, isolation and recovery) service is a data analytics technology to analyze MWD survey data in real-time and more accurately identify the position of a well. The company’s HiFi Nav offering enhances FDIR by targeting improved vertical placement of the directional well within the reservoir. Its HiFi Guidance service utilizes trajectory optimization to determine optimal steering recommendations and placement within the reservoir, targeting minimal sliding, faster ROP, and a higher percentage of the wellbore placed in the desired drilling window. The company provides these services to customers with onshore and offshore operations.
Other Drilling Services — The company services and re-certifies equipment for drilling contractors, and it provides electrical controls and automation to the energy, marine and mining industries in North America and other select markets.
Completion Services Operations
The company’s completion services business consists of services for hydraulic fracturing, wireline and pumping, completion support, and cementing. It also includes its power solutions natural gas fueling business and its proppant last mile logistics and storage business. The company’s completion services business operates in several of the most active basins in the continental United States, including the Permian, the Marcellus Shale/Utica, the Eagle Ford, Mid-Continental, Haynesville, and the Bakken/Rockies. The company’s completion services are designed in partnership with its customers to enhance both initial production rates and estimated ultimate recovery from new and existing wells.
The company utilizes its in-house capabilities, including its data control instruments business, to offer a technologically advanced and efficiency focused range of completion techniques. The majority of revenue for this segment is generated by its hydraulic fracturing business.
Hydraulic Fracturing — Hydraulic fracturing services are performed to enhance production of oil and natural gas from formations with low permeability and restricted flow of hydrocarbons. The process of hydraulic fracturing involves pumping a highly viscous, pressurized fracturing fluid, typically a mixture of water, chemicals and proppant, into a well casing or tubing in order to fracture underground mineral formations. These fractures release trapped hydrocarbon particles and free a channel for the oil or natural gas to flow freely to the wellbore for collection. Fracturing fluid mixtures include proppant that becomes lodged in the cracks created by the hydraulic fracturing process, propping them open to facilitate the flow of hydrocarbons upward through the well. To address evolving customer preferences for emissions-reducing equipment, it has invested in natural gas-powered equipment, including its100% natural gas-powered Emerald line of hydraulic fracturing equipment.
Completion Support Services —The company’s Power Solutions business is an integrated natural gas treatment and delivery solution, which focuses on gas sourcing, compression, transport, decompression, treatment, and related services for oilfield service operations. As part of the company’s wellsite integration strategy to provide and integrate a variety of services for its customers at the wellsite to maximize efficiencies and profitability, in 2022, the company acquired sand hauling, wellsite storage, and last mile logistics assets. The assets acquired were combined with its existing last mile logistics assets to create a leading player in the delivery and storage of proppant at the wellsite.
Wireline and Pumping Services —The company’s wireline services involve the use of a truck equipped with a spool of wireline that is unwound and lowered into oil and natural gas wells to convey specialized tools or equipment for well completion, well intervention, pipe recovery and reservoir evaluation purposes. It offers its wireline services in conjunction with its hydraulic fracturing services in plug-and-perf well completion to maximize efficiency for its customers. Plug-and-perf is a multi-stage well completion technique for cased-hole wells that consists of pumping a plug and perforating guns to a specified depth. Once the plug is set, the zone is perforated and the tools are removed from the well, a ball is pumped down to isolate the zones below the plug and the hydraulic fracturing treatment is applied. In addition, the company offers wireline and pumping services that are not integrated with its fracturing services. The company is one of the leading providers of perforating, pumpdown, pipe recovery, pressure pumping, and wellsite make-up and pressure testing services. It is highly experienced in safely servicing deep, high-pressure, high-temperature wells in some of the most active onshore basins in the United States.
Cementing — The company’s cementing services incorporate custom engineered mixing and blending equipment that is designed to deliver precision and accuracy in providing annulus isolation and hydraulic seal, while protecting freshwater zones from its customers’ zone of interest. Its cement division has the expertise to cement shallow to complex high temperature, high pressure wells. The company also offers engineering software and technical guidance for remedial cementing applications and acidizing to optimize the performance of its customers’ wells. It is one of the largest providers of specialty cementing services in the United States. The company’s operations are supported by multiple full-service laboratory facilities with advanced capabilities.
Completion Service Contracts —The company’s completion services operations are conducted pursuant to a work order for a specific job or pursuant to a contract generally for a specified period of time, which may include minimum revenue, usage or stage requirements. It is compensated based on a combination of charges for equipment, personnel, materials, mobilization, and other items.
Equipment —The company has well completion equipment used in providing hydraulic fracturing services, as well as cementing and acid pumping services. The company periodically evaluate its completion services assets for marketability based on the condition of inactive equipment, expenditures that would be necessary to bring the equipment to working condition and the expected demand for such equipment.
Materials —The company’s completion services operations require the use of acids, chemicals, proppants, fluid supplies and other materials, any of which can be in short supply, including severe shortages, from time to time, and can be subject to significant price volatility. The company purchases these materials from various suppliers.
Drilling Products Operations
The company’s Ulterra business has manufacturing and distribution sites of drilling equipment in North America and internationally, which are geographically positioned to serve the energy and mining markets in over 30 countries. Ulterra’s drilling equipment is used in oil and natural gas exploration and production and in mining operations. Ulterra has manufacturing and repair facilities located in Fort Worth, Texas, Leduc, Alberta and Saudi Arabia and repair facilities located in Argentina, Colombia, and Oman.
Ulterra’s primary business is the design, manufacture, sale and rental of matrix and steel-bodied polycrystalline diamond compact (PDC) drill bits. PDC drill bits are typically rented, except in select international markets where they are sold. Used bits may be repaired and refurbished for the subsequent customer. Ulterra has an industry-leading position in the North American PDC drill bit market.
The company periodically evaluate its drill bits for marketability based on the condition of inactive equipment, expenditures that would be necessary to bring the equipment to working condition and the expected demand for such equipment. The components of equipment that will no longer be marketed are evaluated, and those components with continuing utility will be used as parts to support active equipment.
Other Operations
The company’s oilfield rentals business has a fleet of premium rental tools and equipment and provides specialized services for land-based oil and natural gas drilling, completion and workover activities in many of the major producing oil and natural gas basins in the United States. In addition, it owns and invests, as a non-operating working interest owner, in oil and natural gas assets that are primarily located in Texas and New Mexico.
Customers
The company’s customer base includes major, independent and other oil and natural gas operators. With respect to its consolidated operating revenues in 2024, the company received approximately 53% from its ten largest customers and approximately 38% from its five largest customers. During 2024, one customer accounted for approximately 11% of its consolidated operating revenues.
Seasonality
Seasonality has not significantly affected our overall operations. Toward the end of calendar years, the company experiences slower activity in connection with the holidays and as customers’ capital expenditure budgets are depleted and/or their annual drilling and completion targets have been met. Occasionally, its operations are negatively impacted by severe weather conditions.
Government and Environmental Regulation
The company operates throughout North America and internationally in over 30 countries and, accordingly, are subject to the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and similar anti-bribery and anti-corruption laws in other jurisdictions.
History
Patterson-UTI Energy, Inc. was founded in 1978.
