Following on from the announcement of 26 July 2018, Solo Oil Plc (LON:SOLO), the natural resources investment company focused on acquiring and developing a diverse global non-operated portfolio of strategic oil and gas assets, has today announced the appointment of Alastair Ferguson as a non-executive director with immediate effect.
Mr Ferguson will take over as Non-Executive Chairman following the conclusion of the Company’s AGM to be held later today, when Mr Ritson will retire as Executive Chairman and as a director of the Company and assume the role of Technical Advisor.
Solo Oil Plc is a natural resources investment company with a diverse portfolio of onshore assets, principally in Europe and Africa. The Company seeks to deliver returns through early stage investment in promising projects and uses management’s own sector expertise to assist in strategic asset development. Solo’s portfolio currently includes extensive interests in the prolific Ruvuma Basin in Tanzania, the Horse Hill oil discovery in the Weald Basin, Helium One Limited, the Tanzanian helium exploration company, and Kiliwani North, a natural gas producing project in Tanzania.
Alastair Ferguson
Alastair started his career in 1978 and as drilling and petroleum engineer with BP and took up the role of Operations Manager at Wytch Farm in 1987. From there, he progressed to hold a wide variety of senior operational and business roles globally during the 1990s, before, in 2000, being appointed Chief Executive of BP’s PetroChina joint venture, negotiating the JV framework agreement, gas marketing initiative and leading the integrated team which worked on the evaluation and negotiation of the West-East Pipeline project.
Following roles as business unit leader in China, Middle East, East Mediterranean and India, Alastair moved to Moscow at the time of the TNK BP merger in 2003, progressing to Executive Vice President for Gas and Power. He was responsible for leadership and development of TNK BP’s gas and power business in Russia and Ukraine; strategy and planning, trading, major new gas projects and associated gas business.
From 2011 until 2014, he was Senior Adviser to Xenon Capital Partners, advising Russian and International clients on investing in Russia. He was also an independent non-executive director of JKX Oil & Gas plc from 2011 – 2014. In 2014, he was appointed as an independent non-executive director and, subsequently, executive chairman, of Zoltav Resources Inc. He was substantially involved in the company’s turnaround and the appointment of a new board and management team whereupon he stood down from his role in September 2016. From 2013, he was an independent non-executive director of JSC KazMunaiGas Exploration Production (“KMG EP”) until it delisted from the London Stock Exchange in May this year. KMG EP raised over US$2bn at its IPO in 2006 and produced over 245,000 bopd in 2016.
Alastair is a Chartered Engineer and holds an BSc. (Hons.) in Mining Engineering from the University of Strathclyde and an MBA from the University of Warwick. He is a member of the Institute of Mining and Metallurgy.
