Transocean is releasing an earnings report Wednesday. The company owned the Deepwater Horizon oil rig and provided the crew involved in the deadly Gulf oil spill and explosion in 2010. Three years later, the company is going strong, and analysts are projecting better-than-expected earnings.

There’s a simple reason, says Ben Brockwell, an industry expert with the Oil Price Information Service.

“The reality is, crude oil is a very difficult commodity to find,” he says. “It’s a very difficult commodity to get out the ground.”

But Transocean has the technology to do that, better than probably any of its competitors, says Matthew Jurecky, head of oil and gas research at GlobalData Energy.

Rigs equipped to drill for oil in challenging, remote areas, are in high demand; daily rates have gone as high as $600,000 for some of types in recent years.  That adds up, when you consider that drilling an offshore well can take around 100 days.

Jurecky says Transocean has invested those profits in still better technology. That gives the company an ever bigger edge, as oil reserves become scarcer. He says the company appears to be working to move past the oil spill — and the markets are cooperating.