Permian Midland Basin Panel - M&A and Basin Outlook

George Easterly is Director of Business Development for Apache Corporation. Apache has been operating in the Permian Basin of Texas and New Mexico since the 1990s. The area has played a significant role in the company’s long-term strategy, offering both conventional and unconventional opportunities. As of Dec. 31, 2020, the company has more than 7,000 wells covering a gross acreage position of 4.9 million acres with exposure to numerous plays primarily located in the Midland Basin, the Central Basin Platform/Northwest Shelf and the Delaware Basin. Mr. Easterly re-joined Apache in 2020, prior to which he worked at Scala Energy as Vice President of Finance. Before Scala he worked in various strategic, transactional, planning, and advisory roles at Apache and EY. He holds a BA in Economics from Vanderbilt University and a Master of Accountancy from Vanderbilt University’s Owen Graduate School of Management.

Nick Ludtke has served as the Director of Business Development at Surge Energy since January 2019. Surge is a production company focused on the acquisition and development of onshore oil and gas properties in the United States. They are headquartered in Houston, Texas and currently hold approximately 113,000 net acres in the Permian Basin. Mr. Ludtke previously worked as the Vice President of Finance at Blue Whale Energy, the former business development subsidiary of Surge Energy’s parent company, from 2014-2018.  Prior to joining Blue Whale, Mr. Ludtke worked in various business development roles at Midstates Petroleum and Linn Energy.  Mr. Ludtke graduated from the University of Texas in Austin with a BBA and Masters in Accounting and began his career in public accounting at Deloitte.

Laura Freeman serves as the Vice President of Business Development and Engineering at Vencer Energy. Vencer Energy is backed by Vitol who is the world leader in crude oil trading and has recently acquired Hunt Oil Company’s Midland Basin assets. Prior to joining Vencer, Laura founded and ran Highpoint Global Capital, a technically focused advisory firm helping oil and gas operators find, evaluate, and close acquisitions, divest of properties, and secure bank and alternative financing. She specializes in buy and sell-side advisory, reserves valuation, reservoir and petroleum engineering, analytics, financials, strategic planning and technical due diligence. Laura graduated from the University of Wyoming with a MS in Petroleum Engineering and has an MBA from UCLA Anderson School of Management and a Physics BA from Reed College. She has also been featured as an expert on M&A, banking topics, and Reservoir Engineering for Oil and Gas Financial Journal, Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE), and various industry events and online publications and teaches an ongoing SPE course on M&A and financial modeling.

Zach Fenton is co-founder and COO of UpCurve Energy, a private operator with a 10,000 acre position in the Delaware Basin.  The company was founded in 2015 with a $120 million commitment from Post Oak Energy Capital.  Since then, UpCurve has continued to execute on its development plan, is currently producing >10,000 boe/d, and is looking for new growth opportunities.  Zach previously worked as a Reservoir Engineer on ConocoPhillips’ Eagle Ford team.  Prior to that, he spent several years at ConocoPhillips in various roles between both Houston and Aberdeen. Before joining ConocoPhillips, Zach worked as an Associate at the NY-based private equity firm Lindsay Goldberg and as an Analyst in Morgan Stanley’s Investment Banking Division, where he focused primarily on energy industry M&A and financings.  Zach received an MBA with honors from the Wharton School and a Certificate in Petroleum Engineering from Texas A&M. He graduated cum laude from Duke University with a BA in Economics and is a member of the Society of Petroleum Engineers.