Petroecuador, Petroamazonas merger in 2020

The merger of Ecuador's state oil company Petroecuador and state hydrocarbons E&P operator Petroamazonas will wrap up in 2020, according to energy and non-renewable natural resources minister Carlos Pérez.

The process is part of government actions to optimize public resources and guarantee efficient and transparent management, the ministry said in a statement, following a local radio interview with Pérez.

"Hopefully some day we can take it to market as Ecopetrol, Petrobras and YPF have done which would allow the new company to self-finance itself and not depend on the state," he said.

The process does not entail the sale of the companies, which are currently reconciling their accounts and costs, the statement added.

"It [the merger] is obvious, due to an issue of resource optimization, that in the medium or long-run they will have to be merged. It makes no sense having two parallel state operators in a country as small as ours," Agustín Hurtado Larrea, a hydrocarbons expert and partner at Quito law firm Flor & Hurtado, told BNamericas previously.

INTRACAMPOS ROUND

The ministry also reported that 17 of 33 companies that attended a roadshow event in Houston on Tuesday expressed interest in the Intracampos round which was launched this month.