The company has built up a portfolio of long-life, proven producing oil and gas fields in the US.
Being one of the earlier companies to establish itself in the US, Amadeus struggled initially to gain the attention of the market.
A lack of understanding or belief that it could possibly make money in the US was reflected in the company’s market capitalisation, which from 1996 until 2003 remained low at $8.5 million. Since then, it has increased to the impressive $153 million it is today.
“We are one of the more mature companies of the dozens of Australian players in the US at the moment and we’re probably about the second-biggest of those in the mid to small-cap category,” Towner said.
“America is a very politically stable place to do business. We’ve never had any issues with legal matters or with engineering or banking.
“It’s a great place to do business, complete with infrastructure that is established and well proven.
“You can be drilling a well and be producing oil and gas within 30 to 60 days, then selling it to market and be getting paid for it.”
But not all companies that take the plunge into the US market are fortunate enough to make as big a splash as Amadeus has.
Towner identified the company’s partnerships as being a major reason behind Amadeus’ success.
“In the US, as it is anywhere, if you don’t have good joint venture partners, the chances are you won’t succeed at all,” he said.
“The key to the Amadeus success is that we have been in the US for a long time and we have great joint venture partners.
“As the founders of Amadeus, Rob Scott and I have enjoyed a relationship with our partners for over 20 years.
“These people are industry players. They’re successful, independent producers with well in excess of 20 years experience each as petroleum engineers and petroleum geologists.
“Most importantly, all our US operators and exploration partners are direct investors in all the projects. They all have their skin in the game. None of our partners get a free ride.”
Unlike many other Australian companies operating in the US, Amadeus has been able to maintain a positive cash flow from very early on because of its emphasis on cash-producing assets.
The company’s strategy is to continue growth by acquiring producing assets, developing existing properties and exploring in areas near producing fields.
Earlier this month, Amadeus announced it plans to spend about $21 million drilling at least 13 new deep wells throughout the remainder of 2007, as part of a major expansion to its exploration program.
This expansion involves it farming-in to four new projects in the Gulf Coast area, in well-established play trends and with the potential for deeper exploration.
“$21 million is a lot of money, but we believe it’s a good budget for us,”
Towner said.
“We’ve re-directed away from acquisitions because we believe the returns for the exploration and 3D seismic are worth the risk.”
“Amadeus’ previous success rate gives us the encouragement and confidence in our exploration approach.”
Amadeus has had a 90% success rate in drilling in the first quarter of this year, with 18 out of 20 wells finding hydrocarbons.
Its exploration and appraisal success rate in the second half of last year was 93% (14 out of 15), up from 67% (16 out of 24) for the 2005-06 financial year.
The company plans to drill a further nine wells in Lavaca County, Texas this year, where it has already had significant success.
Amadeus has a 25-50% working interest in various blocks in Lavaca County’s Halletsville deep gas exploration project.
Drilling prospects have been identified in the Lavaca County project area at depths ranging between 6000 and 12,000 feet, with several demonstrating multiple development-well potential.
Targets include the over-pressured sands of the Upper, Middle & Lower Wilcox and Midcox zones.
Reserve potential of successful wells in the Midcox zone in the area has been demonstrated to be in the range of 5-22 billion cubic feet (Bcf) of gas and 150,000-500,000 barrels of oil per well.
According to Towner, interpretation of 3D seismic data enables the program to outperform previous exploration efforts, where historically only geology and 2D seismic data had been used to identify target depths.
“Lavaca County has proven to be a fantastic play,” he said.
“It was a wildcat exploration play surrounded by existing production, but nonetheless it was still virgin territory. The geology and the seismic are fully understood by our partners so we think we are in for a good run there.”
The company is also planning to drill at least 13 deep wells across the four new projects that it announced early this month.
It holds stakes of between 21.9% and 35.1% in two Louisiana and two Texas projects.
Broking house Euroz has said the two deep Louisiana gas plays offer “significant upside potential”.
Towner said Amadeus currently has four drill rigs either drilling or about to start drilling this month.
“We are confident that the intense drilling programs on our existing and new projects will continue to expand our business by increasing our reserves, production and cash flow,” he said.
Amadeus also has several other notable projects.
White Eagle in Kansas was acquired in October 2005. Here, the company has an 85% working interest in 113 petroleum leases containing 300 producing wells located across 16 counties in Kansas.
Amadeus also has an 81% working interest across 26 leases in Shackelford and Stephens counties in Texas and an 82% working interest in the Ford East project, Reeves County, also in Texas.
Combined with its other interests in Oklahoma and Louisiana, the company now has US oil and gas production and exploration interests located across 35 counties.
One of the wells, Hoffer-1, has managed to surprise the company’s experts, coming on production at 5 million cubic feet of gas per day and about 120bbl of oil. Reserve estimates could be around 20Bcf of gas.
