Geophysical firm Westerngeco, part of US-based oil field services firm Schlumberger, has won a KD51m ($184m) contract to gather 3D seismic data on Kuwaiti onshore oil and gas fields.

The contract was awarded on 15 January by state-upstream operator, Kuwait Oil Company (KOC), which awarded a total of $199.6m-worth of contracts in January.

The five-year contract involves the acquisition, processing and appraisal of a range of different data by conducting various imaging techniques that can draw a 3D picture of what lies below the ground. It includes five fields covering 2,895 square kilometres, the world’s largest channel-count seismic survey ever conducted, according to Westerngeco.

Bids were originally submitted in February 2011. France’s CGG Veritas emerged as the frontrunner for the deal with a price of $248m, beating Westerngeco’s proposal of $266m.

However, the tender was cancelled and bids were resubmitted on 15 November with a 25 per cent drop in prices. KOC gave no reason for the cancellation.

Westerngeco won a similar contract with KOC worth $83m in July 2008, and another in October that year, to gather data for Russia’s Gazprom in its Ghadames Basin concession in Libya.