Dana Gas is preparing to award contracts on its offshore Zora gas field in the UAE by the end of February, the company’s chief executive officer (CEO) said after the group’s 2013 financial results conference call.

The Sharjah-based group announced the first contract award on the Zora field in November, handing Adyard Abu Dhabi a $17m deal to build the offshore platform. Dana has also received bids for other packages including a subsea pipeline and onshore processing plant.

“We are on the verge of awarding a whole raft of contingent contracts for the pipeline and the onshore processing plant and we are hopeful that we will be having those awards made toward the end of February,” said CEO Patrick Allman-Ward in a conference call.

Dana Gas has earmarked an investment of $160m in the project, which is expected to start up in the first half of 2015 with a production capacity of 40 million cubic feet a day.

The gas field is split between the northern emirates of Ajman and Sharjah.

Dana Gas, which also operates producing fields in Egypt and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI), increased its net profit in the fourth quarter of 2013 by 12 per cent to AED138m ($38m), while revenues rose by 23 per cent to AED682m.

Annual net profits dropped 5 per cent in 2013 to AED571m due to an increase in royalty payments to the Egyptian government and lowers sales of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) in KRI.

LPG sales were impacted by the repair of the LPG loading facilities at the Khor Mor field in the first half of the year and to under lifting by the region’s Minister of Natural Resource since the facility came back on stream in July 2013.  

Average production increased by 8 per cent to 64,700 barrels of oil equivalent a day (boe/d) in KRI and Egypt compared with 2012’s 59,800 boe/d.