Cairn India brings in two senior oil and gas advisors

Indian oil and gas explorer Cairn India has appointed senior oil & gas advisors Melody Meyer and Atul Gupta to assist in realizing the company’s growth plan.

Cairn said on Monday that the duo, which has over 70 years of combined experience, would help realize the company’s growth plan of contributing 50 percent of India’s crude oil and gas production.

According to Cairn, the company currently accounts for almost 30 percent of India’s crude oil production.

Meyer and Gupta have worked across oil & gas conglomerates such as Chevron, Petrofina, and Burren Energy in the Middle East, Central Asia, and Alaska. They will provide strategic direction to Cairn as the company attempts to reach 5 billion barrels of oil equivalent reserves and to grow and sustain production at 300,000 barrels of oil and oil equivalent per day.

Sudhir Mathur, Acting CEO of Cairn India said: “It gives us immense pride to have Melody Meyer and Atul Gupta with us.

“We are confident that they will play a stellar role in further increasing the operational efficiency and growth of our business.”

Meyer brings 37 years of experience with U.S. oil major Chevron. In her last role as President for Asia-Pacific, she was responsible for driving Chevron’s E&P activities across nine countries in the region. According to the company, she has extensive leadership expertise in global upstream operations, strategic business planning, major capital projects execution, and capital allocation.

In her earlier roles at Chevron, she held leadership responsibilities as President of Energy Technology, Vice President of the Gulf of Mexico SBU, Vice-President U.S. Mid-Continent and Alaska SBU.

Regarding her appointment, Meyer said: “I am very excited to be an executive advisor to Cairn. This will be my first experience in India, one of the world’s most rapidly developing energy markets.

“I am looking forward to adding value to the company’s integrated E&P plans and capabilities and contribute to selecting the right partners for smooth project execution that will be key to the company’s future growth.”

Gupta is a sector professional with more than 36 years of varied global experience. He currently advises private equity firms and sits on the boards of several upstream oil and gas companies including Nostrum (Kazakhstan), Seven Energy (Nigeria), and Vetra Energy (Colombia).

He was also the Chairman and CEO of BSG Resources – a natural resource and power company and before that he was the CEO of Burren Energy.

Atul said: “I am delighted to join Cairn at a time when the company is all set to play an important role in India’s mission towards energy security and sustainability. Further, ramping up the overall crude and natural gas production at reduced costs will be an important step in this direction.”