Malaysia has an estimated proven reserve of 3.6 billion barrels of oil and 84.4 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, while it produces approximately 681,910 barrels a day of oil products as of 2018. It is the second-largest oil producer in Southeast Asia, and the fourth in the Asia Pacific behind China, India, and Indonesia. In terms of LNG and natural gas, Malaysia is the third and ninth-largest exporter in the world.

In the context of domestic upstream activities which spans across 21 Petroleum Arrangement Contractors (PACs) as of October 2019, Malaysia has 353 offshore platforms, 14 subsea structures, 616 lines of pipelines at 10,235km in length, 3,935 total strings, 182 major compressors, 166 crude oil transfer pumps, 281 power generators, 7 FPSOs, 8 FSOs, 1 PFLNG, 4 onshore crude terminals, 7 onshore gas terminals, and 2 onshore crude and gas terminals. In terms of supply bases, it has 3 supply bases, 3 airports, and 7 ports all capable to cater to various demands. On the other hand, in the domain of downstream, Malaysia has 2 refineries, 17 petrochemical plants, 1 refinery complex, 1 petrochemical complex, and 38 terminals consisting of 17 fuel terminals, 13 aviation terminals, as well as 8 LPG terminals and bottling facilities.

Aside from having a well-developed infrastructure mentioned above, Malaysia also presents a great market prospect in the region with a GDP growth rate of 4.7% and having ranked 12th in Ease of Doing Business (EOB) in the world. It has a solid FDI inflow of US$7.6 billion due to attractive investment incentives supported by high cost-competitiveness. This opens the doors for several opportunities in the entire energy supply chain, including drilling tools and perforating systems, as well as intelligent completion and control architectures that ensure production maintains at high levels. Since Malaysia started oil exploration in the 1970s and started active extraction and production in the 1980s, Malaysia also needs decommissioning expertise, as there are currently over 900 offshore platforms of which almost 600 of them are over 20 years old.

Over the years, Malaysia has indeed positioned itself strongly to support the needs of the oil & gas value chain domestically and regionally. This is largely in line with the country’s aspirations to become a regional oil & gas hub.