Post Oak Energy Near Fund II Launch

The possible fundraising move comes after two announced investments in the past few weeks with a combined value of about $85 million by the Houston firm.

Post Oak runs the 2011 vintage Post Oak Energy Partners LP fund and manages $103 million, according to data from Thomson Reuters. Portfolio companies include Core Mineral Operating Co. and Refinery Specialists Inc.

Recently, Post Oak committed $35 million to Maverick Brothers Energy LLC, an independent energy company with more than 10,000 gross acres in Oklahoma with four horizontal gas wells in the liquids-rich Mississippian Osage formation. Post Oak funded $12 million to Maverick Brothers at closing from investment partnerships it manages, with the remaining $23 million on tap to support the energy company’s drilling program and acreage purchases.

In March, Post Oak teamed up with Ridgemont Equity Partners for the first time to set up a 50-50 commitment totaling $100 million to Titan River Energy LLC, a newly formed oil and gas company based in Fort Worth, Texas. Ridgemont Equity is the firm that spun out of Bank of America in 2010. Titan will use the capital to develop and drill oil basins in the Eagle Ford and Permian regions of Texas.

Post Oak’s possible fundraising effort comes as energy continues to draw big chunks of capital from limited partners, despite heavy competition for investor dollars.

With private equity investors eager to get a piece of the action from rising U.S. oil and gas production, energy and power funds raised $11.9 billion in 2012, Buyouts reported in January. The dollar tally ranked third out of 12 categories.