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With Local Capability and Global Technology, Nigeria's Service Providers Headline AEW 2026
Nigeria's oilfield services sector has spent more than a decade building local capability under the country's local content rules, and the companies that have emerged now compete on the same terms as global majors. Several have done so by combining homegrown expertise with international technology, absorbing world-class methods and, in some cases, exporting their own. A number of these service providers are confirmed to speak at African Energy Week (AEW) 2026, which is positioned as the leading platform for forging partnerships and cross-border ties across the continent's energy industry.
SLB, the global technology and services company formerly known as Schlumberger, has operated in Nigeria for close to 70 years. The company has made local content central to its strategy, partnering with in-country suppliers, building regional technical capabilities and running training programs with the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board. Nosa Omorodion, SLB's Country Director for Nigeria, joins AEW 2026, where technology transfer and local participation are recurring themes.
That combination of global technology delivered through local hands also describes the Nigerian firms scheduled to participate. Kenyon International West Africa, a wholly indigenous well services company founded in the wake of the local content act, has built a reputation for solving complex well problems – from controlling blowouts to reviving idle wells. In 2026 it carried out Nigeria's first deployment of FlexSteel flexible pipeline technology, working with the system's Houston-based manufacturer to rehabilitate offshore flowlines in a fraction of the usual time. Founder and CEO Victor Ekpenyong will speak at AEW 2026.
In Rivers State, One Titanium brings together two long-established brands–Titan Tubulars and Oil Tools Africa–to supply and repair oil country tubular goods and run one of Nigeria's largest oilfield machine shops. The group pairs local manufacturing and repair capacity with distribution deals for international equipment lines. Managing Director Tina Unachukwu, a former Baker Hughes executive, is among the AEW 2026 speakers.
Westpaq, a US-based, Africa-focused engineering group, delivers engineering, procurement and construction work in Nigeria through a fully local-content subsidiary backed by an international network of partners. Chief Executive Samuel Diminas, who spent earlier years at NNPC, bp and Chevron, joins AEW 2026 as the group pursues offshore and brownfield projects.
Some firms have already begun to operate internationally, sharing their expertise and services with the rest of the continent. Levene Energies, an integrated Nigerian energy group that began in oil trading, secured a $64 million Afreximbank facility in early 2026 to take a stake in the West African gas and power company Axxela, while its manufacturing arm has begun exporting Nigerian-made solar panels to Ghana and beyond. Executive Vice Chairman Nzan Ogbe joins AEW 2026 as the company expands across the region.
“What is happening in Nigeria's service sector is an example of what local content was meant to achieve: world-class capability owned and led by Africans, built through partnership rather than dependence,” says NJ Ayuk, Executive Chairman of the African Energy Chamber. “AEW exists to bring these companies together with the operators, financiers and technology partners who can take them across borders.”
Taking place in Cape Town from October 12-16, AEW 2026 will gather these service providers alongside the operators, financiers and regulators shaping African energy, reinforcing the event's role as the meeting point where local capability and global technology turn into cross-border partnerships.