Saudi Aramco Energy Ventures (SAEV), a unit of the kingdom’s energy company, is preparing to start a new $500 million fund this year after completing $500m in investments, Bloomberg reports.
The new fund will be “financed primarily by returns on the previous investment, which has backed 45 technology companies, primarily in the US and Europe, since 2012,” according to the report which cited comments from Majid Mufti, the company’s chief executive officer, in an interview on the sidelines of an energy conference in Abu Dhabi.
SAEV also opened an office in Beijing, China in December, adding to offices in Houston, Boston, Aberdeen, Norway and London.
SAEV invests in technologies in upstream and downstream oil and gas, petrochemicals, water, energy efficiency and renewables with application to the Saudi Arabian market. Information and communications technologies applicable to upstream or downstream operations (the “digital oilfield”) are of high interest, the company says.
