AGR Group announced today that Mr Sjur B. Talstad has been appointed Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of AGR Petroleum Services, based in Oslo, Norway, commencing 1st October 2008.
Mr Talstad comes from the position as Vice President in StatoilHydro, in charge of the Sleipner fields in E&P Norway, consisting of the Sleipner East field, the Sleipner West field and the Sleipner Outside area.
Sjur has a broad technical and business career. He joined Statoil in 1986 as a reservoir engineer. He worked with different Norwegian Assets, mainly Statfjord and Gullfaks. He also worked extensively with analysis of reservoir uncertainty, a joint project between Statoil and the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate. After following up gas sales contracts to Europe in 1990, he transferred to Statoil E&P International as a Senior Petroleum Engineer and worked for three years on the fields in Azerbaijan as part of the BP/Statoil Alliance. Sjur also served for three years as Technical Manager in Venezuela. In 2000 Sjur was appointed Senior Vice President within Exploration and Reservoir Exploitation and in 2004 he took over the responsibilities for the Subsurface technologies area in Statoil, before joining his current position in 2007.
Sjur holds Master Degrees in Petroleum Technology and Industrial Economy from the Norwegian Institute of Technology, Trondheim.
CEO of AGR Group, Mr Sverre Skogen commented, "We are very happy that Sjur will take over and lead AGR Petroleum Services into the next phase of its development as we are preparing for a separate listing on the OSE. As a reservoir engineer by training, and with broad E&P management experience in different markets, Sjur is highly qualified to take on this task.
"I would like to thank current EVP of Petroleum Services, Richard Erskine, for the significant work he has done in developing AGR Petroleum Services into one of the world’s leading Well Management and Subsurface providers", said Skogen. Mr. Erskine is leaving AGR to pursue other opportunities and the intent is that after his departure he will continue to be associated with AGR as board member of the listed AGR Petroleum.
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