Ganoub El Wadi Petroleum Company (Ganope) is in talks with five companies over collecting geophysical data in open areas in the company’s geographical scope at a value of $1b, reported Daily News Egypt.

Ganope’s Vice Chairperson for Agreements and Exploration, Osama Farouk, stated that the value of the offers received by Ganope was initially estimated at $758m, however, the company eventually succeeded in increasing the value of the data collection to be around $1b. Accordingly, two offers to collect data are expected to be merged.

The five companies in negotiations with Ganope are PGS, CGG, KGS, Schlumberger, and Nageco.

As Farouk pointed out, Ganope followed the Gulf of Mexico’s experience in data collection including submission of proposals, negotiations over convergent offers, and the possibility of awarding two or more bids to the competing companies.

Ganope will study the presented offers and award the tender within two months.