By Alex MacDonald

LONDON--Eurasia Drilling Co. Ltd.(EDCL.LN) on Thursday said a group of its executives and shareholders have made an offer to take the company private after Schlumberger Ltd. (SLB) backed out of a $1.7 billion deal to purchase a stake in Russia's largest onshore drilling company.

Schlumberger backed out after the Russian government failed to approve the deal by a deadline imposed by the Western oil-services giant. The collapse of the deal highlights the deteriorating relationship between Russia and the West amid sanctions over Ukraine.

Eurasia Drilling said it has received an offer of $10 a share from an unnamed group of executives and shareholders for the company. It didn't provide much details about the structure of the offer. The group wants to take the company private because it believes it will allow the company to create the financial flexibility to restructure the business so it can sustain itself through an expected period of prolonged and difficult market conditions.

"While EDC's fundamentals are still robust in the long-term, the current performance is significantly impacted by a combination of challenging macro-economics, acceleration in ruble depreciation, continued geopolitical risks, upstream capex cuts by the Russian oil majors on the back of oil price pressure, compounded by changes in tax regulations for the oil sector, weak pricing for drilling, poor forward visibility on offshore activity and uncertainty in the services market stemming from sanctions," the company said.

The company has set up a special committee within its board and hired advisers to make a recommendation on the offer to its board.

--Selina Williams and Ed Ballard in London contributed to this story.

Write to Alex MacDonald at alex.macdonald@wsj.com

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(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 08, 2015 03:12 ET (07:12 GMT)

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