Boru Energy mulls acquisition of Occidental Petroleum’s shares in Ghana

Founded in 2019, Boru Energy is the upstream branch of the American Carlyle Group. The start-up plans to play a leading role in African oil and natural gas.

Boru Energy, which is backed by private equity giant Carlyle Group, has begun negotiations with Occidental Petroleum to buy its shares in the Jubilee and TEN producing fields in Ghana. It is proposing $500 million to acquire this portfolio, which includes 24% interest in Jubilee and 17% in TEN fields.

Occidental, which acquired the shares when it bought compatriot Anadarko in 2019, has since sought to get rid of them to better focus on its core shale business.

Boru Energy is led by Aidan Heavey (pictured), founder in 1985 and former CEO of Tullow. He had been involved in the development of the Jubilee and TEN fields, of which the British company is still the operator. According to banking sources close to the transaction, this would mark a symbolic moment for Heavey, who withdrew from the company in 2013 after missing production targets.

Today, Jubilee and TEN produce 83,600 and 48,700 barrels of oil per day, respectively, according to the annual production report released at the end of 2020. The usable base is approximately 2.5 billion barrels of oil equivalent.

For the past five years, Carlyle has been interested again in Africa, where he is eyeing interests in Morocco, Gabon, Algeria and Ghana, among others.

Source: Agence Ecofin