CEO, Upstream, Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC)
Virtual fireside chat with Musabbeh Al Kaabi: COVID-19 and the future of investing in energy
Musabbeh Al Kaabi, CEO of Mubadala Investment Company's Petroleum & Petrochemicals platform, discusses the changing ...
Transcript (33 segments)
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Fred Kemp0:04
Welcome everyone. I'm Fred Kemp, President and CEO of the Atlantic Council, and thank you all for joining us today via Zoom for our virtual fireside chat with the Chief Executive Officer of Mubadala Investment Company's Petroleum and Petrochemicals Platform, Musabbeh Al Kaabi. We've found that the term social distancing isn't exactly right—we have physical distance, but we've learned through these virtual events that we're actually creating greater social closeness. One of our most valued partners and people we turn to for advice is Mr. Al Kaabi. His background is too rich for me to list in full, but he joined the company in 2013 as Chief Growth Officer, responsible for new business developments and acquisitions. Before that, he had a 16-year career at Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, where he led many terrific initiatives including ADNOC's first-ever offshore high-pressure, high-temperature gas reservoir hydraulic fracturing project. He also led efforts to assess unconventional resources and negotiated joint venture agreements with international oil companies in Abu Dhabi. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Geophysical Engineering from the Colorado School of Mines and a Master of Science in Petroleum Geoscience from Imperial College London. I'm delighted to be hosting this under the auspices of the Global Energy Center. Randy Bell and his amazing team, and Emily Burlingame, have been doing amazing work in this virtual space. At the Atlantic Council Global Energy Forum in Abu Dhabi this January, Musabbeh gave us great insight into Mubadala's investments in natural gas and renewables, and discussed the importance of ESG standards in the petroleum and petrochemicals industry. I don't think any of us would have guessed how much the world might have changed since we met in Abu Dhabi, but it has, and that's what we'll be talking about. Even before this pandemic, Mubadala made ESG a priority. As a parent company of Masdar, it has always had a deep interest in renewables, and as it continues to expand global petroleum and petrochemicals investments, it remains committed to these standards—raising awareness, mitigating waste from downstream products like plastics, and investing in efficient, emissions-conscious technologies. Mubadala's robust portfolio has positioned the UAE to remain resilient in times of crisis and oil price volatility. Its diverse group of energy, IT, healthcare, and biotech investments helps the UAE respond to the unique challenges of COVID. Mubadala has played a leading role in the UAE's response to the severe public health crisis and unprecedented low oil prices. Before we begin, this event is entirely virtual—if you're interested in asking questions during the Q&A period, please submit them using the Q&A function at the bottom of your screen. You can also submit questions via Twitter using the hashtag #ACEnergy, and follow the Atlantic Council Global Energy Center at @ACGlobalEnergy. Let's get started. First, let me say Ramadan Mubarak and Eid Mubarak—I think in a couple of days we'll be experiencing that, so best wishes to you. What is this period of time like in a COVID-19 crisis for you personally, for your friends and family? And then after that, we'll get to talking about Mubadala's response.
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi5:30
Hello everyone, and thank you Fred for a very nice introduction. I am truly pleased to be with all of you today in good health. These are unprecedented times—back in 2019, none of us could have envisioned a situation with this pain and magnitude. The fact that we're doing this virtually is a testament that our lives have turned upside down, but on social, business, and personal levels, we can share many experiences. Let me share a few based on my interaction with the team here in Abu Dhabi. We decided back in March to implement remote working, and it's been a mixed feeling initially, but overall it's a rewarding experience. I've seen my team become more engaged, productivity increased significantly, and we have a better work-life balance. I can spend more time with my family now. I also want to recognize and thank our healthcare professionals—I'm truly impressed with the work being done, especially here in the UAE and globally. They've put themselves on the front lines fighting this pandemic. Mubadala has a dedicated healthcare sector, and we've played our role globally and locally to combat COVID-19, sharing expertise through institutions like Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi. The UAE raised the alarm early in January and February, identifying two critical sectors: food security and healthcare. The government took bold steps to ensure the UAE has adequate food supplies and an equipped healthcare system. Overall, it's been a unique experience. We've also worked with our international assets to ensure critical industries like food packaging and medical applications operate at maximum capacity to provide raw materials for essential sectors. Mubadala also launched a dedicated campaign to put the right resources in place for local communities and support local governments.
As I mentioned, running our business remotely has been initially met with some skepticism, but overall it's been very rewarding. I see people more engaged, more productive, very swift in answering emails and engaging. Productivity has improved—I'm not exaggerating. I think that's one of the silver linings of the pandemic, and hopefully we'll take these lessons and rewarding experiences with us post-COVID-19.
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Fred Kemp11:03
Thank you so much for that. I'm sure we'll have more questions about those broader issues, but let's shift to the petroleum and petrochemicals business. For those who may not know the company as well, how does this fit into the overall Mubadala portfolio, and how has COVID-19 affected that business? What impact has there been?
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi11:37
The energy portfolio—petroleum and petrochemicals—in Mubadala is fully diversified across the full value chain. We have assets under management of around $40 billion, active in upstream, midstream, and downstream, including petrochemicals, and we're now exploring the energy transition. For the audience not fully aware, Mubadala is a sovereign wealth fund and global investor with $229 billion in assets under management, active in 15 different sectors including traditional energy, information technology, real estate, healthcare, and technology. Back in 2005-2006, we decided to be ahead of the game and invest more in renewables. We're very proud that one of the leading renewable energy companies in the region and globally, Masdar, is part of our family. We're a diversified institution when it comes to energy—the fully integrated oil and gas business. We have been impacted strongly by COVID-19, and it's across the board—not just energy; every sector in the economy has been impacted.
Back in 2019, when organizations like Mubadala run their business plans, we envisaged a correction—probably the worst case scenario would be a recession with an equity market correction of around 30%. But we had not envisaged a pandemic of the scale we see currently. I'm really proud of what we've done with the portfolio because when something like this hits, the first question is how do we ensure we emerge efficient and resilient. I'm proud of the collective work done by Mubadala and its assets to come up with hundreds and thousands of initiatives to weather this storm. However, it might have some long-lasting impact, and we're currently assessing what that could be. Like any other institution, we came up with three basic recovery scenarios: V-shaped, U-shaped, and L-shaped. We rolled out the V-shaped recovery model, and now we're more focused—I would say 70% probability that we're experiencing a U-shaped global economic recovery. We think global GDP will drop significantly this year, but next year we hope the global economy will recover to a growth of around 5%. For the L-shaped recovery, we're monitoring that scenario, but currently there's about a 30% probability. We're keeping our eyes open and adjusting accordingly. Our vision is to emerge with minimum damage and as resilient as possible. The good news is that this isn't the first time we've seen a big disruptive event—in 2014-2015, I managed Mubadala's upstream business when oil prices dropped to almost $20. We initiated a big campaign to ensure future resilience, and those initiatives from 2016 have proven very rewarding. I'm very proud that we're already partially ready for these situations, and we're tackling it professionally. There's truly amazing work being done by many people, and I see it on our assets—we're doing our best to emerge stronger from this recession.
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Fred Kemp16:51
Thank you so much for that. Let me dig into that a little bit more. First of all, let's hope for that 5% growth return and a U-shape versus L-shape. It's interesting to hear the 70% view is U-shaped. Looking at the overall $229 billion under management, $40 billion in the field you're overseeing, how is this broader set of investments right now in petroleum and petrochemicals helping the UAE manage this oil price volatility? Can you give any specifics of what you've already implemented because of the COVID crisis?
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi17:45
When it comes to the country, the UAE has done a great job. We started a long time ago embarking on a big, aggressive diversification program back in 2006. The journey is in progress—the aim by 2030 is to achieve an acceptable level of diversification away from conventional oil and gas. Mubadala's mandate was to help and be a catalyst for economic diversification. Looking back 15 years, we've managed to establish totally new industries in the country—in aluminum business, through a partnership with Dubai running one of the largest aluminum smelters globally; in information technology, a well-established business; and in renewable energy, Masdar has been a fractional company in the region and globally to invest in renewable energy, on the right trajectory to become a leading renewable energy company globally. Many sectors were introduced as a result of initiatives driven by Mubadala and others to help diversify the economy. The UAE has several parameters that differentiate it in the region: a population of around 9.9 million, large oil and gas reserves—we were upgraded last year to become the sixth-largest oil and gas reserves globally. But not only the scale, also the resiliency—the word 'resilient' has become very relevant to what we do. The UAE oil and gas industry is definitely resilient, very low-cost production, and will remain profitable for any possible scenarios in the energy transition. On top of that, we have a very effective governing structure—the government took bold steps in January and February to focus on healthcare and food security, with relatively quick decision-making. Last but not least, the UAE has a very strong sovereign wealth fund, be it ADIA or Mubadala—we're playing our role to generate sustainable returns to the shareholder, which is the government. We've also established very strong partnerships with reputable partners from around the world. Last year, we brought in Cepsa as a strategic partner, complementing each other. It's a multiple of factors that differentiate the UAE and put it on the right track. Maybe the UAE is the only country in the world with a dedicated Minister for Artificial Intelligence—which tells us we strongly believe in a different future, one where technology will be a critical part of our integrated economy. I'm very optimistic that with the current governing structure, leadership vision, and dedication, we'll put this country on the right track.
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Fred Kemp23:09
That's a fascinating answer, and sixth-largest oil and gas reserves in the world—I don't think everyone on this call knew that. The story of resilience is also very interesting. The next face you'll see on the screen, I think Musabbeh will be familiar with—she's a regular attendee of our summits in Abu Dhabi. She's from RBC and a member of the Atlantic Council's Board Executive Committee. Halima, over to you.
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Halima23:50
So many great events. I wanted to ask you about the diversification drive. You mentioned and we all know the role that Mubadala has really played in the diversification efforts of the UAE. Rendering now all the oil price volatility that we've seen since the start of the year, will this price volatility only accelerate the diversification drive in the UAE and the region? And one of the obstacles that oil-producing countries talk about when trying to diversify—what do you think the biggest obstacle has been for these countries?
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi24:23
That's a great question, Halima, and good to see you by the way. I see a trend of accelerated diversification. Abu Dhabi started the diversification journey back in 2006-2007 when we launched Masdar as a symbolic commitment to our future. I'll give you one complete example: yesterday we announced a partnership with Honeywell to produce N95 masks in a facility owned by Mubadala called Strata, which manufactures composites for airplanes—customers include Boeing and Airbus. Because of the pandemic, demand for these composite parts dropped significantly. So we scratched our heads and asked what we could do with this very sophisticated manufacturing facility in the UAE. We signed with Honeywell to convert part of the manufacturing capability into the medical sector. In a matter of one month—we modified equipment, bought new equipment—and yesterday the company started producing N95 masks at a rate of 90,000 masks per day. That's one example that shows we have the will, capability, vision, and strategy. There is no excuse for anyone in this country not to work hard to fulfill that vision. I'm very optimistic because there are many ideas. One of the outcomes of COVID-19 is a global trend—many people are raising flags that we cannot rely on a single supply chain or a single country. We've realized we heavily depend on certain countries, and there will be a redraw of the global supply chain map. The UAE is well-positioned by its strategic location as a hub, and hopefully we'll take advantage of these mega-trends to accelerate diversification efforts.
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Fred Kemp27:33
I have a couple of questions that I'm going to group together here. After this group, I'll turn to another regular of our events in Abu Dhabi, Adam Sieminski from KAPSARC. But let me first turn to these written questions. Dahlia Naher of Reuters—forgive me if I didn't pronounce that correctly—her question is: Were there any specific projects or expansion plans in certain regions or countries that were deferred because of coronavirus? How are investments for this year affected? Any limits? And the second part is: Has the impact affected any renewable energy projects or further implementation of some of them?
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi28:42
That's a great question and a typical one when it comes to the business. Yes, we've identified two categories: what is critical and important and must-have, and what is optional and good-to-have. Many of our asset activities fall into one of these categories. We've pushed many activities away—these are good-to-have, not critical. For non-critical capex programs, we pushed those back, and some OpEx programs we reduced significantly. But for big-ticket items, we stick with our previous plan. Let me start with upstream: we're progressing very well with the big gas development project in Southeast Asia in Malaysia—that hasn't seen any slowdown except maybe a few weeks of lockdown. For Borealis, one of the assets we manage, they have a $1 billion project in Belgium—PHH—that's progressing with no slowdown. In normal chemicals in North America, we have a big cracker program as well, and currently we're committed to ensuring these programs are executed within the allocated timeframe. In a nutshell, many unnecessary OpEx and capex programs are being deferred. We're trying to reduce costs as much as possible and walk the talk on resilience. When it comes to renewable energy, I don't see any slowdown. Abu Dhabi announced a big solar project recently with a truly impressive cost per kilowatt hour—1.3 cents—which is a remarkable drop. That will open doors for solar energy to expand further. I don't see any slowdown in solar and renewable projects in the country; if anything, I see more push into the sector.
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Fred Kemp31:37
Very interesting. I have one more grouping of questions before I turn to Adam. Here it is: Mubadala—what is the appetite for US LNG export projects after your investment in NextDecade? So he's asking about the whole unconventional gas and oil sector more broadly, and then more specifically the US LNG export projects related to your investment in NextDecade.
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi32:31
That's a great question. There is no doubt that prior to COVID-19, the most interesting development in the energy sector in the last 30 years was the shale revolution—the technologies of hydraulic fracturing, horizontal drilling, the significant resources in the US, and what made the US one of the leading oil and gas producers globally. As a result of this shale revolution, there are many associated activities. On one hand, we see expansion in downstream like petrochemical industries; on the other hand, the ability of the US to become one of the leading energy producers and exporters globally. Our thesis has been challenged, but we still believe it's valid in the long term. You cannot ignore the Permian—it will be developed, produced, technology will improve and unlock additional resources. Current oil prices may not help, but what they'll do is slow the growth of shale production, not completely kill it. We still believe the world needs unconventional and conventional resources, and both will play a role going forward to meet global energy demand. I'm not extremely worried about the potential expansion of LNG in the US—contrary, they'll keep pushing that, and the US will become a key exporter of LNG globally, underpinned by business fundamentals and the need for oil and gas at least for the foreseeable future.
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Fred Kemp34:49
Thank you for that interesting answer, which I'm sure a lot of our listeners in the United States will be encouraged by. Let me turn to Adam Sieminski, President of KAPSARC. Adam, we've reached you in Riyadh.
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Adam Sieminski35:14
I'm in Riyadh and we're doing okay here.
Thank you, Fred. Dr. Al Kaabi, in a carbon-constrained world, finding ways to reduce, reuse, recycle—maybe even remove carbon dioxide—is going to be increasingly important. I know Abu Dhabi already has a project underway taking carbon dioxide from a steel plant and using it to drive oil production. Do you see other opportunities for investment that could promote finding ways to manage carbon dioxide, so that Abu Dhabi's hydrocarbon assets—the oil and gas—can continue to be used?
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi36:06
Adam, very good question. Let me take you back to the early seventies to share our commitment as a country to environmental aspects. Historically, Abu Dhabi has been a responsible energy provider. Back in the seventies, when many countries around the world used to flare hydrocarbon-associated gas, we decided to take a bold step and built the first LNG project in the Middle East. It started operations in 1977—that was a visionary step by the leadership to ensure the UAE develops its natural resources as a responsible developer and provider of energy. In the nineties, we adopted a very aggressive zero-flaring program and became one of the least flaring countries in oil and gas activities. As you rightly said, we also embarked on a very challenging project at the time—capturing CO2 emissions from a steel factory in Abu Dhabi and injecting it 70 kilometers away into one of the oil fields. That showed strong leadership and responsibility when it comes to climate change and CO2 emissions. A combination of commitment to renewable energy, carbon capture, zero flaring, more renewable energy in the future, and the peaceful nuclear program to replace some gas-fired generation—all these initiatives are putting the UAE at the forefront when it comes to tackling climate change. As a responsible developer and provider of energy, we need more of these initiatives in the future. It could happen next year, it could happen in ten years, but ultimately it's going to happen. When you look at how the climate change agenda has developed from the late eighties to now, it's really sad to see that the industry lost the narrative—the narrative has been controlled by media and politicians, resulting in more pressure on the industry. It is prudent, critical, and important for oil and gas producers globally to embrace, adopt, and implement the latest technology when it comes to eradicating CO2 emissions. It is not an option—it's a must, especially in view of ESG. We need to show the world, capture the narrative, and demonstrate that we are a responsible producer of energy with the minimum possible carbon footprint.
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Adam Sieminski39:44
Thank you very much. A follow-up question: Even before the COVID-19 outbreak, ESG was a major topic—what you're talking about was a major topic for energy companies. During the COVID-19 crisis, several oil majors have announced net zero commitments. How does Mubadala think about this question of that sort of commitment?
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi40:14
It's becoming very critical in our business. We are a global investor, so we definitely need to show we are a responsible investor. I don't want to repeat what I've said before, but when you look at Mubadala's portfolio, we invest in renewable energy, in technology. We have a venture capital team investing in many startup companies promoting energy transition. On my platform as well, last year we initiated a big study to look at how we see ourselves in five to ten years and how we position ourselves in the energy transition, identifying a few interesting ideas. Mubadala takes ESG very seriously. We have established a committee, which I'm part of, to understand the requirements and implications on us as an investment institution, and we're in the process of finalizing our ESG policy sometime during this year. We share the same concerns like everyone else. We have been a responsible investor, invested in many sectors supporting the energy transition and decarbonization of the economy going forward. ESG will be part of our activities going forward. Is it going to change the current portfolio? Not much. But going forward, it will have an impact on our decisions when it comes to new investments.
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Interviewer42:06
Thank you so much for this answer. Here's a question from Maura Al-Zawahri: What technologies does Mubadala focus on? AI used to be a nice-to-have, but now with COVID, it's a must to achieve operational excellence even from afar.
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi42:27
To start with, Mubadala is a big believer in technology and looking forward. We try to identify trends that will shape the future. With our growth strategy, we identified some of these trends, and we believe technology will play a big role in shaping the future. It will disrupt everything—not just energy, but many conventional industries including financial institutions, banking, airlines, transportation, and healthcare. AI is one of the key themes of technology we're looking at. We have venture capital teams in Europe and in San Francisco. These teams work to identify suitable opportunities and startup companies with the potential to reshape the future. That's what our team is spending their time on—identifying these trends and being part of the future. Technology has historically been part of our investments, is currently part of our investments, and will continue to be. The combination of artificial intelligence and automation is a very interesting theme to explore in the region. It could put the UAE in an interesting position because we have access to low-cost energy and can build industries deploying automation and artificial intelligence, potentially becoming suppliers of industrial products in the future. This is a vision that many people within the organization and within the country are closely monitoring, and hopefully we'll plant our flag somewhere in this journey.
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Fred Kemp44:44
Here's a question that we just got from Jim Hanami of OM LNG: How have current challenges offered opportunities for organizations to be more agile, shifting strategies and reprioritizing? I know for us at the Atlantic Council, we've made more changes in the digital space in nine weeks than in the previous two years. Let me turn to Adam Sieminski.
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi45:27
I saw an interesting graph recently that Zoom—the one you and I are using now—its capital value is equivalent to many airline companies in the US. That tells you how the world is changing. COVID-19 has truly reshaped our lives, both on the business side and on a personal level. What I can say is that COVID-19 is almost a wake-up call, and we need to reset our mindset when it comes to investment. The big question would be: in the future, is my business resilient—not only to recessions, but to pandemics? What trends do we see that would benefit from this pandemic or emerge as a result of it? On top of my list would be technology and life sciences—biotechnology. These are two very interesting sectors to monitor. In the energy sector, any investment taken with a view of the energy transition would be attractive to many investment companies around the world. We'll probably see more effort in the energy transition going forward, but oil and gas will remain a significant part of the energy future. We need to keep monitoring the landscape in view of the energy transition. We may see a world where oil peaks around 2030—could be slightly earlier, could be slightly later—but that's the reality. We need to be sure that whatever scenario we see, any business should remain resilient and efficient to weather the storm.
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Fred Kemp47:52
The next person to appear on your screen—it's almost as if we're holding the Atlantic Council Global Energy Forum in Abu Dhabi right here on our screen. She's a great partner of ours, former leader at IRENA. Over to you, and where we've reached you.
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Interviewer48:12
I'm taking refuge in New York. My sabbatical at Harvard was truncated by COVID, and I'm just waiting to go back to Abu Dhabi. All my friends are asking if I'm okay in New York because they're very afraid of the situation here. I'm fine. Musabbeh, great to see you. I very much enjoyed your comments and recognized very much the strategy unfolding over the last eight or nine years in the UAE. One of the key things I've seen is that when you have a real diversification strategy—and many people struggle with what diversification means for resource-dependent societies—the UAE has made tremendous progress. The Strata example and manufacturing N95 masks in such a short period was really inspiring. Please send me a few when they're ready—I can't get them in New York. I wanted to ask you one thing: the level of disruption we're seeing is historically unprecedented in the global economy. We've never seen anything like this, and all our bets about what shape recovery we'll have—we can hope for the best, but it's unknown. I was very interested that you stressed the strategy of focusing on technology, especially artificial intelligence and biotechnology. I've also seen remarkable progress in the UAE in developing farming, for instance. Do you see these emerging technologies being utilized not only as an investment strategy but also as an industrialization strategy? Is this how you're seeing this? I want to make one last comment: you were quite optimistic about the recovery of shale. My sense is that shale has taken such a beating and is so heavily leveraged that this shock is going to shake out that industry quite dramatically, because their cost of production is way higher than anything the market will bear for the coming time. Will that have an impact on the global oil market after recovery?
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi50:51
I think we miss you in Abu Dhabi, and I hope to see you soon. I hope you stay safe in New York, and it's been a pleasure knowing you. When it comes to technology, we picked up on technology big time, starting with Masdar back in 2006. People at that time were asking, 'Are you kidding me? An oil-producing country with a renewable energy impact?' That was truly visionary at the time, and we proved to be correct. I'm really glad to see Masdar as a global leader in technology. I'm confident it will play a big role in the future. I don't like the argument when people say technology will disrupt oil and gas—technology will disrupt every aspect of our society and economy: healthcare, financial institutions, many sectors. I agree with you—technology will enable countries like the UAE to build into the future. You mentioned farming. I'm really intrigued by the fact that we managed to produce the lowest-cost energy globally through solar energy. That's unlocking many other sectors that depend on energy. We'll see how these sectors develop in this region, taking advantage of almost free energy from solar. And looking at the technology side—artificial intelligence, automation—if you couple these two with access to affordable energy, there are many sectors that can be opened in this region. The sky's the limit. I'm optimistic that some of these industries will really be established here, transforming the region from heavy dependence to a more diversified economy. On the shale revolution—I partially agree with you, but I think it will stay. If you look at global oil demand, it's going to peak probably in the next five to ten years, maybe around 105 or 106 million barrels per day, and then gradually decline. You need massive investment just to minimize the natural depletion of around 5%. On top of that, I would say 10 million barrels of oil per day is not profitable at prices below $35. The high-cost producers probably will set the price floor. If the price is $35 to $45, it will allow at least the Permian in the US to continue producing, but not on the same scale and growth we've seen in the last two or three years. It will be heavily impacted, but it will remain a producer for the foreseeable future. We live in a very volatile environment—my view today might be different next week, but that's what we see based on information available today.
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Fred Kemp56:27
We've run out of time. Let me close with a couple of questions. Here's one from Carlos Pascual—you know Carlos quite well, a member of our board, former ambassador to Mexico, Ukraine, and many other feathers in his very large cap. His question: How do you see your investment portfolio balance in a decade in terms of regional balance, a shift further to Asia, and the share of hydrocarbons, recognizing your points on the energy transition? Let me also include a question from earlier on Egypt—how you see Egypt developing.
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi57:48
Carlos, nice to see you—missing you in Abu Dhabi. When it comes to our portfolio, we are strong believers in a progressive, forward-looking approach. We're not in a state of denial—we understand the energy transition, we're committed to ESG, and we take decisions to ensure our portfolio remains relevant and resilient under different energy outputs. Mubadala will take the energy transition very seriously, identify opportunities that fit our investment thesis, and continue. We're also strong believers that the energy transition will come with stronger demand for natural gas. If you look at the current portfolio, it's gas-weighted—more than 50% of the upstream part is gas. We believe natural gas will play a complementary role in diversifying global energy demand. We'll continue monitoring these trends, and I see Mubadala's portfolio in five to ten years being resilient and fit for the future. On Egypt—there's no doubt Egypt is the largest market in the Middle East with about 100 million people. The latest discoveries in Egypt have reshaped the energy landscape in the eastern Mediterranean, and we're glad we made the right decision to be part of the giant Zohr field. We have very strong partners, we're very satisfied with the market, and the project is going in the right direction with upside in the future. Egypt ranks very high in the region due to its market economy and resource base. Overall, very positive about Egypt.
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Fred Kemp1:00:29
It's clear from the lineup of questions that more and more people are willing to pitch in, so perhaps in another couple of months we may want to do this again. I want to thank you for taking so much time, Musabbeh. I want to thank this rich group of people with a lot of expertise joining. Carlos, thank you for that last question. We hope you'll all attend our next session.
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Musabbeh Al Kaabi1:01:05
Thank you, Fred. Thanks a lot, and thanks to everyone.
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Fred Kemp1:01:08
Please.