Meet Ainojie ‘Alex’ Irune, MD of Oando’s new subsidiary bought for $783m

In August last year, Oando Plc, a Nigerian energy company listed on both the Nigerian Exchange Limited and Johannesburg Stock Exchange, completed the acquisition of 100 percent of the shareholding interest in the Nigerian Agip Oil Company (NAOC) from Italian energy firm Eni, for a total consideration of $783 million.

Following the acquisition, NAOC was renamed Oando Energy Resources Nigeria Limited, and Ainojie ‘Alex’ Irune was appointed as the managing director. He doubles as an executive director on the board of Oando.

Prior to the appointment, Irune was the chief operating officer at Oando Energy Resources, the upstream subsidiary of Oando, and president/CEO of Oando Clean Energy Ltd.

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“An advocate of transformational leadership, Dr. Ainojie ‘Alex’ Irune has over 20 years of multisectoral experience across energy, business/IT consultancy, research, innovation and development,” Oando said on its website. “He has also been instrumental in workforce-based initiatives to promote a more diverse and inclusive environment as well as build a positive internal culture.”

Before he was appointed as COO in 2018, Irune was the chief strategy and corporate services officer at Oando from 2016 to 2018. He also served as the head of corporate communications from 2013 to 2016, where he oversaw all internal and external brand-building efforts across the company’s business entities.

He spearheaded the global communications strategy following Oando’s successful $1.5bn acquisition of ConocoPhillips Nigeria’s upstream assets in 2014.

He joined Oando in 2011 after working in the United Kingdom as an in-vehicle systems designer with Nissan, Honda, and Jaguar Land Rover. He graduated from the University of Nottingham with a B.Sc. in Computer Science in 2002, and attained his PhD in Computer Science from the same university in 2009.

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