Led by Patricia Campos, Head of Procurement and Contracts Division at TotalEnergies, and Adão Costa, Procurement Manager at ExxonMobil, the respective sessions will offer practical insight into how local companies can position themselves to secure contracts across Angola’s expanding upstream industry. Taking place ahead of the main conference – scheduled for September 9-10 -, the workshops strengthen AOG 2026’s role as a platform for translating investment into tangible opportunities for Angolan businesses.

TotalEnergies’ workshop comes as the operator advances a multi-billion-dollar offshore portfolio. The company is developing the Kaminho project in Block 20/11 alongside Sonangol and Petronas – the first large-scale deepwater development in the Kwanza Basin. Sanctioned in 2024, Kaminho will feature a zero-flaring FPSO with capacity of 70,000 barrels per day, with first oil targeted for 2028.

The company has also extended licenses for strategic producing assets, including Block 32, creating a framework for further development across six discoveries surrounding the Kaombo Norte and Kaombo Sul FPSOs. Through its role in the New Gas Consortium (NGC), TotalEnergies is at the forefront of Angola’s non-associated gas development. The NGC achieved first gas production from the Quiluma field in 2026, paving the way for a diversified energy mix in Angola. Campos’ workshop will provide a direct interface between those suppliers and the procurement processes governing TotalEnergies’ activities.

Meanwhile, ExxonMobil is pursuing a dual-track strategy combining redevelopment of mature producing assets with frontier exploration. In April 2026, the company awarded an EPCI contract to Subsea7 for its Likembe Redevelopment 2.0 Project, which will connect additional reservoirs to existing Block 15 facilities through subsea tiebacks. ExxonMobil and its partners have also moved to extend production from the Mondo and Saxi-Batuque fields following the extension of Block 15’s production license through 2037.

Beyond Block 15, ExxonMobil is expanding its exploration footprint. The company partnered with TotalEnergies and Angola’s National Agency for Petroleum, Gas and Biofuels to secure exploration rights across multiple blocks in the frontier Benguela and Namibe Basins, while subsurface evaluation continues across additional offshore acreage. Costa’s workshop will share insight into how Angolan companies can position themselves at the forefront of these developments.

By placing procurement managers directly in front of Angolan businesses, AOG 2026 will give domestic suppliers greater clarity on what major operators need, how procurement decisions are made and where opportunities are emerging. As billions of dollars move into Angola’s upstream sector, the September 8 sessions will help ensure more Angolan companies are equipped to move with them.

African Energy Week (AEW) 2026, taking place October 12–16 in Cape Town, will bring this issue into focus through a dedicated session at the Upstream E&P Forum: Resource Nationalism, ESG and Investor Protection: The New Frontier of Oil and Gas Arbitration in Africa. Sponsored by Africa-focused legal and advisory firm CLG, the panel will bring together operators, investors, legal practitioners and government representatives to examine how commercial agreements can be structured to manage disputes before they escalate.

Nigeria provides a clear example of how the legal architecture around upstream investment is evolving. The Petroleum Industry Act, enacted in 2021, overhauled the country’s petroleum fiscal and regulatory framework, changing the terms governing production-sharing contracts, joint ventures and other upstream arrangements. Nigeria has also strengthened its dispute-resolution framework through the Arbitration and Mediation Act of 2023, while the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission has promoted an Alternative Dispute Resolution Center designed to provide a sector-specific mechanism for resolving upstream disputes.

Senegal illustrates another dimension of the challenge. Following first oil at the Sangomar field in 2024 and a rapid production ramp-up, the government established a commission to review existing oil and gas contracts with operators including Woodside and bp. While governments retain the sovereign right to review their resource agreements, such processes can alter the commercial assumptions underpinning investments and raise questions around stabilization provisions, production-sharing terms and other contractual protections.

Across parts of West Africa, political transitions, security disruptions and changes to mining and petroleum legislation are adding further uncertainty for investors. At the same time, geopolitical shocks and shifting global energy policies are testing agreements that were negotiated under very different market conditions. For companies committing billions of dollars to long-life upstream projects, the ability to anticipate and manage those changes has become an increasingly important component of investment decisions.

Arbitration remains a central tool. A review by Nigerian law firm OAL found that by 2025, most cross-border oil, gas and power agreements in Africa expressly identified arbitration as the preferred dispute-resolution mechanism. At AEW 2026, the Upstream E&P Forum panel will examine why arbitration continues to dominate cross-border energy contracts and how bilateral investment treaties, domestic legislation, ESG obligations and changing regulatory requirements interact when disputes arise.

“You cannot do a deal in Africa today without thinking seriously about how you would resolve a dispute if the terms change. We’re increasingly seeing arbitration planning as part of the commercial conversation from the start, and rightly so,” said NJ Ayuk, Executive Chairman of the African Energy Chamber. “That commercial focus is central to AEW 2026, which brings governments, investors, operators and legal experts together to address the practical conditions required to unlock the continent’s next wave of energy investment.

The Resource Nationalism, ESG and Investor Protection session will examine the intersection of contractual protections, regulatory change, political risk and the technical complexities of energy projects, giving investors and governments a practical forum to consider how stronger dispute-resolution frameworks can support Africa’s next generation of oil and gas investment.

AFC’s 2026 deal flow demonstrates the depth and breadth of that capital. In August, the institution led investors into a $2.5 billion private placement for the Dangote Petroleum Refinery and Petrochemicals complex in Lagos, the largest publicly disclosed primary equity private placement in African history. The deal was oversubscribed 3.7 times. In July, AFC reached financial close on the $753 million Lobito Corridor Railway Project in Angola alongside the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) and the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA), a 1,300 km cross-border rail rehabilitation linking the Port of Lobito with the DRC border. AFC financing also supported what will become Burkina Faso’s largest power plant.

AFC raised a record $2 billion syndicated loan in June, upsized from an initial $1.6 billion target, drawing lenders from Asia Pacific, Europe, the Middle East and Africa. In July it raised $500 million through a Eurobond at the tightest pricing in its history, and in August it became the first African institution to issue a digital bond, raising CHF 350 million on a regulated Swiss digital exchange. AFC’s assets now exceed $19 billion, while its membership spans 48 African countries. The institution holds A-level investment-grade ratings from both S&P and Moody’s.

AFC’s Gold Partnership gives AEW 2026 delegates direct access to an institution that operates across the full infrastructure and energy value chain, from project development and advisory through to equity, debt and risk mitigation. The corporation’s State of Africa’s Infrastructure Report 2026, launched in Nairobi in April, found that Africa’s non-bank domestic capital pools now exceed $2 trillion and argued that the priority has shifted from raising capital to deploying it productively. AEW 2026 is built around that challenge, and AFC’s presence strengthens the event’s ability to connect bankable projects with the institutions prepared to finance them.

“AFC has shown consistently that African infrastructure and energy projects can attract serious capital when the structuring is right and the institutions behind them are credible. Having them at AEW strengthens the conversation between project sponsors and the financiers who can move deals forward,” says NJ Ayuk, Executive Chairman of the African Energy Chamber.