UAE-based National Petroleum Construction Company (NPCC) has won the first package on the offshore Umm al-Lulu oil field development in Abu Dhabi, according to sources close to the bidding process.

The estimated $800m engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract was awarded by project operator Abu Dhabi Marine Development Company (Adma-Opco), which is carrying out a full field development of Umm al-Lulu over the next five years.

MEED reported that NPCC was the frontrunner to win Umm al-Lulu package one in February after commercial bids were submitted for the contract in November 2012.

South Korea’s Hyundai Heavy Industries, Australia’s Leighton Offshore, the UK’s McDermott and Petrofac, Italy’s Saipem, South Korea’s Samsung Engineering and France’s Technip also submitted commercial proposals on the deal, which covers the construction of wellhead towers, pipelines and associated facilities.

Adma-Opco has still to award the larger second package for the Umm al-Lulu field. Samsung Engineering and a consortium of NPCC and Technip have resubmitted bids for the EPC contract after Italy’s Saipem’s low bid was rejected by Adma-Opco.

Umm al-Lulu is located in the Gulf about 30 kilometres northwest of Abu Dhabi.

The project forms part of Adma-Opco’s plan to add 300,000 barrels a day (b/d) of production capacity from four new offshore fields, with about 100,000 b/d coming from both Umm al-Lulu and the Satah al-Razboot (Sarb) field, where the main EPC contracts were awarded earlier this year.

Adma-Opco is majority-owned by Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc), with minority stakes held by the UK’s BP, France’s Total and Japan Oil Development Company (Jodco).