On May 2, 2017, the Mexican government, through the Comisión Nacional de Hidrocarburos (National Hydrocarbons Commission or “CNH”), commenced an international tender process to grant a license agreement in partnership with the productive state-owned enterprise PEMEX Exploración y Producción, to engage in extraction activities in conventional onshore wells located in the State of Tabasco, Mexico.

This will be the third and fourth farm-out agreement to be offered by the CNH as part of the historic reforms enacted by the Mexican government to open the oil & gas sector to private and foreign investment since 2013, following the awarding of the Tríon farmout to BHP Billiton Petróleo Operaciones de México, S. de R.L. de C.V. in late 2016.

The international tender processes identified as CNH-A3-Cárdenas Mora/2017 and CNH-A4-Ogarrio/2017, respectively, are addressed to domestic and foreign private companies and comprise the auctioning of a 168.5 sq. Km on the Cárdenas-Mora area and 155.00 sq. Km on the Ogarrio area, both located in the Cuenca del Sureste in the Gulf of Mexico, one of the main oil production regions in the country.

The information on the contract areas will be available to the parties in a data room between May 2 and June 27 (access should be requested within this timeframe). Interested parties will need to pay a registration fee and request a pre-qualification appointment between May 2 and June 30, 2017. The pre-qualification petitions should be filed between July 3 and July 7, 2017 and pre-qualified bidders will be announced on August 23, 2017. The parties may visit the contract areas between August 1 and August 23, 2017. The bids will be due and opened on October 4, 2017, and the award of the process will take place on October 6, 2017. More detailed information about these bidding processes is available at the following links:

Special thanks to Ana María Alpízar, Shearman & Sterling Visiting Attorney, for her assistance with this alert.