South Korean shipyard Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering (DSME) has cancelled a drillship order after the customer missed a payment.

In a Korea Exchange filing, DSME said that the KRW703.4bn (US$592.5m) order was placed by an Americas-based customer in July 2013.

The drillship was to be delivered in November 2015, but DSME decided to terminate the contract as the customer defaulted on a payment instalment.

The customer was not identified but IHS Maritime's Sea-Web data indicates the customer is Vantage Drilling.

The drillship, Cobalt Explorer, has been built and launched.

DSME said it would try to sell the vessel and would consider legal action against its customer to seek compensation.

The collapse in oil prices has caused drilling companies to either cancel or defer deliveries of drillships that were ordered speculatively, as oil majors cut back on exploration and production work.