Bruce Dingwall, the oil industry entrepreneur who built Venture Production into one of Scotland's biggest companies, is returning to the quoted arena in a £45 million takeover deal.
His Trinidad-based Trinity group has agreed a reverse takeover of Bayfield Energy Holdings, which listed on the Alternative Investment Market 15 months ago, giving Trinity a fast track to an already-planned public listing.
Mr Dingwall told The Herald the new group now planned to expand its Edinburgh office as a UK base.
Bayfield shares, which have lost two-thirds of their value since May, were suspended yesterday at 20.75p, valuing the group at £44.9m. Its share- holders will have a 45% share of the new Trinity Exploration & Production.
Mr Dingwall, who will be executive chairman of the enlarged group, was one of three founders of North Sea explorer Venture Production in 1997 and led it to a stock market listing five years later. But in 2004 he fell victim to City pressures after the firm had missed some production targets. He stood down, to be replaced by Mike Wagstaff.
Venture was snapped up by gas giant Centrica in August 2009 for £1.3billion, after a five-month hostile bid battle saw Centrica swallow up 29.9% of the shares.
Meanwhile Mr Dingwall, born to English parents in Trinidad, had picked up Venture's Trinidadian assets in 2005, leading a group of founding shareholders to create Trinity.
It expanded its licence portfolio in 2008 with the acquisition of four onshore licenses from Primera Oil & Gas and last year merged with Oilbelt Holdings, doubling the production base of the company.
At a time of depressed oil production for Trinidad & Tobago, Trinity also improved the terms of licences and secured financial incentives to encourage drilling activity, having led the regional industry in two years of negotiations with the Government.
Trinity, which now employs more than 200 staff, made a pre-tax profit of $13.4m (£8.4m) last year on turnover of $54m (£34m) and assets of $55m.
Bayfield, which has interests in Trinidad and South Africa, had been reviewing its options after an unsuccessful attempt in May and June to raise equity funding to strengthen its cash position and fund its ongoing drilling commitments.
The AIM-listed Trinity will be the largest Trinidad-focused oil and gas group, with 11 operated fields and net production of approximately 3800 barrels a day.
Led by Mr Dingwall and chief executive Monty Pemberton, it will now finalise project targets before embarking on a fund-raising roadshow .
Mr Dingwall said Trinity had a key role in helping Trinidad lift its oil production. He said: "It is kind of like what I did in the late 1990s, leading the way in the North Sea as a brand new independent and taking big operating positions."
He said the business now had "critical mass" which would enable it to tap into necessary funding.
Mr Dingwall said: "We are doing 3000 to 4000 barrels a day. We would like to see that grow now, to increase reserves, and look at new business."
Trinity has bid in partnership with Cairn Energy for a deepwater block in a current Trinidad licensing round.
Mr Dingwall, still based in Perthshire, has made two successful Scottish investments in recent years, in the MTEM oil technology group which he chaired and sold to PGS in 2007, and in the Tullibardine distillery, sold to Picard a year ago.
On returning to the pressures of a market listing, Mr Dingwall commented: "When I started doing it 14 years ago it was pretty new to me. Now I'm more experienced and thicker skinned. People forget Venture was a huge industrial success and one of Scotland's top companies."
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