Dana acquires North Sea assets from Suncor

• 14 years ago (2010-09-08)
• Junior Isles

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Suncor Energy Inc has reached a deal to sell a number of UK offshore North Sea properties for about $390 million to an affiliate of Dana Petroleum PLC.

The transaction involves Suncor's Petro-Canada UK unit's 12 offshore production and exploration licences in the UK sector of the North Sea.

Production from those assets to date in 2010 has averaged approximately 16 000 barrels of oil equivalent per day net to Suncor. Dana said the acquisition gives it 33.5 million barrels of oil equivalent of proven and probable reserves, boosting the company’s value in the face of a prospective hostile takeover bid by the state-owned Korea National Oil Corp, worth about $2.9 billion.

The sale is expected to be finalised in the last quarter of this year, subject to Dana’s shareholder approval.

Richard Griffith, analyst at Evolution Securities, has said the latest acquisition was “the worst kept secret in the market,” and said the Korean bid is likely to succeed. Interestingly though, Dana shares were fractionally lower at 1805 pence during Wednesday morning trading on the London Stock Exchange.