(Reuters) – Oil services company BJ Services filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Monday morning following a sharp drop in demand and a cash crunch from the coronavirus pandemic. coronavirus.

The company, which offers hydraulic fracturing of shale wells, said it was in talks with bidders for the sale of its cementing business and part of its fracking operations.

“The severe downturn in business and the resulting lack of cash has resulted in an unmanageable capital structure,” chief executive Warren Zemlak said, and added that BJ Services was working with its lenders to secure cash to fund the sale.

The fracking company, which filed for Chapter 11 in the Southern District of Texas bankruptcy court, listed assets and liabilities of between $500 million and $1 billion.

BJ services, which operates in shale basins in Canada, said it would file for protection under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act for an orderly liquidation of operations in the country.

Oil services giant Baker Hughes Co struck a $6.8 billion deal to buy the company in 2010.

In 2017, BJ Services began operating as an independent joint venture after Baker Hughes sold a 53.3% stake in the hydraulic fracturing and cementing business to private equity firm CSL Capital Management and West Street Energy Partners of Goldman Sachs for $325 million.

BJ Services, which has teams in shale basins across the United States and Canada, with its plans for a $100 million initial public offering in 2019, which it originally filed in 2017.