ADNOC eyes cross-border opportunities

The Emirati company is ramping up its overseas expansion programme, taking it into new geographic areas that challenge long-held assumptions about Gulf NOCs

ADNOC Drilling, the publicly traded subsidiary of the UAE’s NOC, announced in late May that it would acquire a majority stake in services company SLB’s land drilling business. The bid for a 70% share places a unit of ADNOC for the first time in neighbouring Oman and Kuwait’s upstream sectors in a sign of its growing cross-border footprint. This encroachment into rival Gulf states’ terrain was followed in mid-June by an audacious $19b acquisition bid for Australia’s Santos from ADNOC’s gas-focused overseas investment vehicle XRG, aimed at grabbing a slice of Asia-Pacific LNG market. The latter bid faces an array of regulatory hurdles, and success is not guaranteed. But taken together, these o