Acquisition by Oil & Natural Gas Corp. of the Indian governments’ majority interest in Hindustan Petroleum Corp. Ltd. (HPCL) will not result in a merger, according to an ONGC executive (OGJ Online, July 18, 2017).
A.K. Srinivasan, director-finance, told reporters that HPCL, which operates refineries in Mumbai and Visakhapatnam and a joint-venture refinery in Bathinda, will remain a stand-alone company after ONGC acquires the 51% interest in a deal expected to be valued at $5 billion.
A federal budget presentation early this year suggested value-chain integration through the merger of some or all of the country’s state-owned oil and gas companies (OGJ Online, Feb. 2, 2017).
