SYDNEY: Saudi Aramco and Abu Dhabi National Oil Co have been separately studying potential bids for Australia’s Santos Ltd, as the Middle Eastern energy giants seek to ramp up their gas investments overseas, people with knowledge of the matter say.

State-owned Aramco and Adnoc have been conducting preliminary evaluations of Santos as a possible acquisition target, the people said, asking not to be identified because the information is private.

Shares of Santos have gained about 1% in Sydney trading this year, giving the company a market value of A$24.9bil (US$16.7bil).

Santos has liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects in Australia, Papua New Guinea and Timor-Leste that are prized for their proximity to fast-growing demand from Asia.

It also has gas operations focused on the Australian domestic market as well as conventional oil assets in Alaska.

Santos declined to comment. A representative for Adnoc declined to comment, while a spokesperson for Aramco didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Gulf countries are investing billions of dollars in gas, which is seen as an important bridge fuel in the energy transition.

Qatar plans to nearly double LNG export capacity, and Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are pumping cash into domestic fields and building trading operations globally.

Aramco in June reached an initial agreement to buy a stake in Sempra’s Texas LNG export plant in a deal that would include fuel shipments from the project.

The Saudi firm made its first deal to purchase LNG from the United States in the same month, signing a 20-year non-binding contract to take 1.2 million tonnes per year of LNG from NextDecade Corp’s planned project in Texas.

 - Bloomberg