A Birmingham-based energy company is making its largest acquisition ever – a $1.3 billion deal to add a Texas oil and natural-gas producer with operations in Texas and Oklahoma.

Diversified Energy Monday announced an agreement to acquire Maverick Natural Resources, creating a company with combined assets of about $3.8 billion.

Diversified, formerly known as Diversified Oil & Gas, has holdings in oil and natural gas, as well as transport, marketing and well retirement. Based in Houston, Maverick is a private oil and gas company owned by EIG Global Energy Partners.

The deal is expected to close during the first half of this year, subject to closing conditions. As part of the deal, Diversified Energy is expected to assume about $700 million of Maverick’s outstanding debt.

Diversified CEO Rusty Huston Jr. said the deal adds “a complementary portfolio of attractive, high-quality assets.”

“Notably, the combined footprint in Oklahoma and the Western Anadarko Basin creates one of the largest in terms of production and acreage, which includes the emerging Cherokee formation,” Huston said.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the union would expand the company’s presence into the highest-producing U.S. oil patch, the Permian Basin, an area near the Texas-New Mexico border.

Maverick produces an average of 77,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day, while Diversified Energy provided roughly 138,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day, on average, during the third fiscal quarter of 2024.

Maverick CEO Rick Gideon said his company has “great respect for the innovative approach and stewardship demonstrated by the team at Diversified and are pleased to enter into this partnership.”