Exploring frontier areas of the world

Under the leadership of Chairman and CEO Gene Van Dyke, Vanco Energy Company and its predecessor companies have explored frontier areas of the world for more than 40 years.

When the North Sea was opening up in the early 1970’s, Van Dyke’s company was one of the first independents to compete for licenses.  For 22 years the company focused on offshore Netherlands, discovering the Rijn Field, the P/8 gas field and the Q/13 field among others.

With the emergence of deepwater technology in the early 1990’s, Van Dyke seized the opportunity to identify and acquire a series of deepwater licenses offshore Africa, becoming for a time, the largest deepwater license holder in the region.  By 2003, the company had over 10 million acres under license, equivalent to 70% of the exploration area of the Gulf of Mexico, with operating commitments offshore Gabon, Côte d’Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, Ghana, Senegal, Namibia, Morocco and Madagascar.  Between 1998 and 2007, Vanco acquired 25,591 Km 2d seismic and 19,198 Km² 3d seismic, creating a valuable understanding of West Africa’s deepwater potential that led to 8 successful drilling programs by 2006.

Around the same time Vanco identified the untapped potential of the Black Sea.  In pursuing the Prykerchenska area offshore Ukraine, in 2007, Vanco won the license in a competitive bid against ExxonMobil, Shell, TPOA and Hunt, becoming the first U.S. company to be awarded a Production Sharing Agreement by Ukraine for it’s portion of the Black Sea.

Over the years, Vanco has been joined in its projects by numerous international oil companies and national oil companies, among them: BG Group, CNOOC, Devon, Eni, ExxonMobil, Kerr-McGee, Nexen, Norsk Hydro, Oil India Limited, ONGC Videsh, Petronas, Repsol, Shell, Sinopec, SK Corporation, Total and Unocal.

In 2008, the investment of LUKOIL Overseas Holding produced a series of new lease acquisitions, seismic surveys and well programs under Vanco Exploration Company.  These efforts resulted in discoveries offshore Ghana (Dzata well, February 2010) and Côte d’Ivoire (Independence, December 2011).

Today, Houston-based Vanco Energy Company remains active in Vanco Exploration while developing a portfolio of unconventional oil and gas outside the United States.