Russia-India consortium bids for TNK-BP's Udmurtneft oil producer

MOSCOW, May 2 (UNI) A Russian-Indian oil and gas consortium today said it had lodged a bid for Udmurtneft, the main oil producer in the Volga republic of Udmurtia.

The company is currently owned by Russian-British joint venture TNK-BP.

Consortium OVIT comprises Russia's Number one independent natural gas producer Itera and ONGC Videsh Ltd (OVL), an overseas exploration unit of India's state-owned oil and natural gas corporation ONGC. Itera holds a 51 per cent stake in the consortium, while OVL holds 49 per cent.

At their meeting on April 28, Itera shareholders authorised the company's director general to sign a document allowing OVIT to bid for 96.86 per cent of the charter capital of Udmurtneft, owned by TNK-BP Holding and Novy Investment Ltd., RIA Novosti news agency reported.

The TNK-BP board of directors will discuss an auction procedure at its meeting later this month.

Earlier reports said Deutsche Bank, running the sell side of the deal, became the nominal holder of 99.49 per cent of ordinary and 88.99 per cent of preferred non-documentary shares of Udmurtneft on April 20.

The Russian anti-monopoly watchdog allowed ten Russian and foreign firms to bid for a controlling interest in Udmurtneft.

Udmurtneft, which has annual oil production of some 6 million metric tonnes, is currently developing 26 oil fields in the region.

Udmurtneft has a charter capital of 3.56 million rubles (about 130,000 dollars) divided into 2,671,549 ordinary and 890,517 preferred shares, each with a face value of 1 ruble (about 0.03 dollar).

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