Key Energy in Play With Baker Hughes Chasing Shale Oil: Real M&A

Baker Hughes Inc. is looking at deals as it tries to extract bigger profits from the boom in U.S. shale-oil exploration. That may put Key Energy Services Inc. and Lufkin Industries Inc. on its wish list.

Baker Hughes, which provides drilling services to oil and gas companies, is seeking opportunities to make acquisitions, Andy O’Donnell, its president for the western hemisphere, said this week. After spending $7.1 billion on BJ Services Co. last year to gain a pressure-pumping business that helps drillers unlock oil trapped in shale, Key Energy, which hauls the fluids used in hydraulic fracturing, and Lufkin, a maker of pumps used to extend well production, may now make sense for Baker Hughes, Cambiar Investors LLC and Tudor Pickering Holt & Co. said.