UPDATE 2-Kentz H1 profit rises, sees meeting FY market view

* Says pipeline of prospects at $2.8 bln at end-June

* Interim dividend of 2 cents, up 5 pct from last year

* H1 revenue almost flat

* Says to expand into offshore oil & gas sector (Recasts, adds CEO comments)

By Tresa Sherin Morera

BANGALORE, Sept 14 (Reuters) - Irish engineering group Kentz Corp Ltd (KENZ.L) posted a 10 percent rise in first-half pretax profit helped by a good spread of projects across all its business lines and said it was confident of meeting full-year market estimates for revenue and profit.

The company said its reorganisation into three business units to EPC (engineering , procurement and construction), construction and technical support services gave it access to new projects.

"That (the reorganisation) would account for one of the reasons why we've seen a large growth in our pipeline of prospects, which is grown from just over $2 billion to currently $2.84 billion of work that we are tendering and looking to receive contracts on," Chief Executive Hugh O'Donnell told Reuters on Monday.

The company said its trading since end-June continued to be in line with market expectations.

Analysts on average are expecting the company to post a pretax profit before items of $44.7 million on revenue of $710 million for the year ending Dec. 31, according to Reuters Estimates.

Kentz, which focuses on the oil and gas industry worldwide, declared an interim dividend of 2 cents, up 5 percent over last year's 1.9 cents.

The company said it received more than $250 million of new orders in the past few months from the Gorgon project in Australia, which is one of the largest project outlets of the group.

The Gorgon project, which is a joint venture between the Australian units of Chevron, Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM.N) and Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSa.L), received a final investment decision on Monday. [nSYD478497]

For the six months ended June 30, the company said its pretax profit rose to $18.5 million from $16.8 million.

Revenue was nearly flat at $328.8 million as revenue from the group's EPC business decreased due to some delays in the award of new projects in the latter half of 2008.

"However, those projects have recently got a go ahead and are now moving ahead. So over the second half of the year, we do expect to see stronger revenues than we did in the first half," Chief Financial Officer Ed Power said.

EXPANSION PLANS

The company said it had set aside funds for expansion into the offshore oil and gas industry.

Kentz also said it was looking at a couple of prospects for acquisitions and that it planned to sign a deal soon.

"We are now sitting on a cash balance of about a $156 million. We can cut out a substantial portion of that to help finance the strategic acquisition... and obviously to cater for the organic growth, which is how we've grown our business today," O'Donnell said.

Kentz shares were down 2.7 percent at 197 pence at 1117 GMT on the London Stock Exchange. (Editing by Jarshad Kakkrakandy)