Tanzanian billionaire Edha Nahdi's Amsons Group is in advanced talks to acquire Oryx Energies for $250 million

Tanzania's Amsons Group is in advanced negotiations to acquire Oryx Energies in a deal estimated at $250 million, according to sources familiar with the matter, in a transaction that would hand the Tanzanian conglomerate control of one of East Africa's most strategically positioned energy businesses.

Officials at Amsons Group's Tanzania operations declined to comment when contacted Monday. But two sources with direct knowledge of the talks said negotiations are at an advanced stage and are being handled out of Oryx's headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, where the Swiss-based energy company is registered.

"The negotiations are almost complete and involve Oryx's fuels and lubricants business as well as its shares in Tanzania International Petroleum Reserves Limited," one source said, speaking on condition of anonymity ahead of any official announcement.

TIPER, as the petroleum reserve facility is commonly known, sits in the Kigamboni industrial area in Dar es Salaam, directly across from the city's main port. It is jointly owned by the Tanzanian government and Oryx Energies under a 50-50 shareholding arrangement. Originally built as a refinery in the 1960s, the facility was converted into a petroleum storage depot after the refinery shut down in 2000. It now functions as one of the largest bulk fuel and petroleum storage terminals in sub-Saharan Africa, receiving cargo from large incoming vessels through a single-point mooring system and redistributing product to oil marketing companies across the region.

If the deal closes, it would be the most consequential energy acquisition by a Tanzanian private company in the country's history, and would transform Amsons into the dominant independent energy distributor in East Africa.

Amsons would inherit not just TIPER's storage infrastructure but Oryx's entire downstream ecosystem in Tanzania, including lubricant blending facilities and a broad network of service stations. The company has supplied fuels to sectors ranging from mining and construction to the hotel industry and maritime operations, and has historically served several landlocked neighbors, including Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda, Malawi, eastern Congo and Zambia.

The deal's timing is notable. Tanzania's LPG market is growing at a pace that has drawn the attention of every major energy investor on the continent. National LPG consumption rose 38 percent to more than 403,600 metric tonnes in the most recent reporting year, driven by the government's aggressive clean cooking campaign and a cylinder subsidy program aimed at reducing household dependence on charcoal, firewood and crop residues.

Oryx has led that market for years, but its grip has been loosening. According to data from the Energy and Water Utilities Regulatory Authority, Oryx Energies Tanzania currently holds a 35.2 percent share of the LPG market, down sharply from 46.6 percent in 2020. Taifa Gas has been the primary challenger, climbing to 32.1 percent over the same period, with Manjis Gas holding a further 15.8 percent.

The government's clean cooking strategy aims to raise the proportion of households using clean energy from roughly 7 percent in 2024 to more than 80 percent by 2034. Current adoption is estimated at about 24 percent. In a move to stabilize supply and bring down consumer prices, the Energy and Water Utilities Regulatory Authority recently integrated LPG into the Petroleum Bulk Procurement System.

Oryx has not sat idle during the competitive shift. In February 2026, Oryx Gas Zanzibar Limited announced a distribution partnership with TP Company Limited to expand LPG supply to the archipelago. And earlier in May 2026, during a visit by Tanzania's Parliamentary Committee on Energy and Minerals to Oryx's Dar es Salaam operations, committee chairperson Subira Mgalu noted that Oryx had contributed roughly 1.2 trillion Tanzanian shillings to the country's gross domestic product between 2021 and 2024, while generating around 1,000 direct jobs and 25,000 indirect ones.

That contribution, and the market position it reflects, is precisely what would make an Amsons acquisition so significant.

Amsons Group, led by chairman Edha Nahdi, has been on an extraordinary regional expansion in recent years. The company acquired Kenya's Bamburi Cement for approximately $300 million in late 2024 in one of the largest cross-border corporate transactions in East African history, then signed a separate $250 million contract to build a clinker production plant in Kwale County. It also secured a controlling stake in East African Portland Cement and signed a $900 million agreement to develop 1,300 megawatts of power generation capacity in Zambia.

The Oryx deal, if confirmed, would push Amsons further into the energy sector and give it a vertically integrated position across storage, distribution and retail that no other Tanzanian-owned group currently holds.

Tanzania is simultaneously positioning itself as a broader LPG hub for East and Central Africa, with major energy firms investing in receiving terminals and storage capacity at Dar es Salaam and Tanga. A completed Amsons-Oryx transaction would put a Tanzanian company at the center of that infrastructure push rather than at its margins.

Neither Amsons nor Oryx Energies had issued a public statement on the negotiations as of Monday.