French oil merger

A holding company embracing all state-owned French activities in the oil industry, Erap was an important step on the road to the integrated oil company Elf Aquitaine.

Its activities covered the whole spectrum from drilling and production to retail sales. The merger took place at the initiative of President de Gaulle, who was actively concerned that French industry should be competitive. In Norway, it was followed up two years later by merging the Auxirap Norge A/S and Petropar Norge A/S subsidiaries.

This raised Petropar’s holding in Petronord to 39 per cent, making it the largest single shareholder. A few months later, the name of the merged company was changed to Elf Norge A/S.