IAE 2027's Exploration and Discovery Forum Centers African Upstream Capital
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The African upstream sector is experiencing an economic boom and investors are paying close attention. The continent accounted for roughly 40% of the world's high-impact exploration wells in 2025 and 2026, the largest share of any region. In parallel, upstream spending across Africa is projected at $41 billion in 2026, with frontier basin drilling topping $10 billion for the first time since before the pandemic. Licensing rounds are also open or advancing in Nigeria, Libya, Algeria, Angola, Egypt, Sierra Leone and across the MSGBC basin.
For a continent that has long struggled to attract its share of global exploration capital, the pipeline of available acreage and investable opportunities is now larger and more diverse than at any point in the past decade.
The Exploration and Discovery Forum at Invest in African Energy (IAE) 2027 in Paris, May 11-13, is designed to connect the companies and institutions behind this activity with the capital needed to advance it. The forum brings operators, NOCs, geoscience companies, independents and financial institutions into a structured setting built around Africa's upstream investment opportunity.
Discussions will span subsurface prospectivity, licensing strategy, investment risk and the financing structures required to move projects forward. This integration of geology with capital allocation distinguishes IAE as the premier industry event where technical expertise meets high-level financial decision making.
The timing of this year’s forum is critical in light of recent global events. Major supply disruptions, including the extended closure of the Strait of Hormuz, have redrawn the map of where energy importers source oil and gas. European and Asian buyers are actively seeking non-Russian, non-Middle Eastern supply, and Africa's producing and emerging basins are positioned to respond. Algeria's first bid round in a decade awarded five of six blocks under improved fiscal terms, driven in large part by European demand for alternative gas supply. Libya's first licensing round since 2007 awarded 22 blocks. Egypt, too, has opened its Red Sea offshore for the first time. These are examples of African producers responding to a global crisis with investment-ready acreage, as IAE 2027 sets the stage to match their supply with the capital they need to explore, drill and export.
Alongside the established producers, frontier basins are drawing new entrants. Namibia's Orange Basin, where approximately 6.2 billion barrels of oil equivalent have been discovered, is on track for first production before the end of the decade. Chevron entered Guinea-Bissau's deepwater in late 2025, while Eni secured 15 blocks offshore Guinea and a first entry into The Gambia in June 2026. Sierra Leone is also preparing its sixth offshore licensing round with the first drilling in over a decade expected this year. Modern seismic acquisition and AI-driven interpretation are helping operators evaluate these basins with higher confidence and lower pre-drill risk, shifting the economics of frontier exploration in Africa's favor.
The Exploration and Discovery Forum runs alongside IAE's Commodities and Capital Allocation Forum, the Grid Convergence Forum and the dedicated Business-to-Government (B2G) Day, giving investors a single platform to engage across upstream, power, critical minerals and energy finance. Together, the forums reflect IAE's positioning as the event where African energy investment decisions are shaped, connecting the continent's resource base with the global capital seeking to develop it.
Invest in African Energy returns to Paris for its fifth edition on May 11-13, 2027. To sponsor or register as a delegate, contact sales@energycapitalpower.com. For more information, visit www.invest-africa-energy.com.