A new closed joint-stock company, Offshore Oil Company KazMunayTeniz, has been created as part of KazMunayGaz (Kazakh oil and gas extracting and transporting) national oil and gas company. It will develop offshore oilfields on the Caspian shelf. A source in KazMunayGaz has told Interfax-Kazakhstan that Baktykhoja Izmukhambetov has been appointed the head of the company. Previously Izmukhambetov held the office of executive director of offshore projects at KazMunayGaz, and also headed the Kazakh-Turkish Kazakhturkmunay oil exploration company. The source said that “the organisational issues are still being discussed”, but added that “most probably it (the company) will be a state company”.