Spanish major Repsol-YPF became the first company to make this breakthrough by signing up for the Reynosa-Monterrey block for $2.4 billion. A group led by Brazil's Petrobras and another, led by a subsidiary of Argentina's Techint group, also collected contracts. They were later followed up by San Antonio-based Lewis Energy.
Bidding was not as competitive as the Mexicans would have liked, and there was a poor showing from the heavyweights outside the Hispanic world, but Pemex believes that the $4 billion in investments expected under these contracts will be enough to ensure that output in the basin will double to 2 billion cubic feet per day by 2006 as planned.
The
