Inpex, Japan's largest upstream company, announced that it plans to bid in a tender recently launched by Iran to develop the country’s Azadegan oil field.
"Inpex is in the process of gathering information and conducting updates as necessary. Inpex will consider its response once the tender is published and the terms and conditions pertaining to the tender and oil contract are clarified,” Platts reported on Tuesday, citing a company spokesman as saying.
Top Iranian officials said in the past two days that Iran had launched the tender for the development of the Azadegan field in the country’s southwest, and had already invited international oil companies to participate.
National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) Managing Director Ali Kardor said on Sunday that the tender would be held before this coming Friday, with invitation letters to file proposals to be sent to 29 international oil companies.
Azadegan, which is estimated to have up to 42 billion barrels of oil in place and is considered Iran’s biggest onshore field, currently produces less than 50,000 bpd, but Iran hopes to increase production volumes to between 300,000 bpd and 320,000 bpd, according to Platts.