Aker ASA expects Ghanaian authorities to approve a revised $4.4 billion development plan for the offshore Pecan oilfield by the end of the third quarter of 2019, the Norwegian investment firm's chief executive told Reuters on Friday.

The company had previously said it expected the plan to be approved in the summer of 2019.

"We still expect the production to start 35 months after the plan's approval. We are working to see how can we get the costs down, but today we maintain the same budget," Aker Chief Executive Oeyvind Eriksen said.

The Pecan field will be run by Aker's subsidiary Aker Energy, which submitted its original development plan on March 28.

Aker, controlled by Norwegian billionaire Kjell Inge Roekke, has said it wants to make Aker Energy a leading exploration and production company on the Ghanaian continental shelf.

In addition, Aker also plans to invest in Ghana's oil service industry, Eriksen said.

Roekke wants companies in Aker's portfolio, Aker BP and Aker Energy, to produce a total of one million barrels of oil per day by 2025, he announced earlier this year.

Separately, Eriksen also said Aker Solutions, Norway's largest oil services companies, will expand its oilfield maintenance and modification business, as well as renewable energy, in particular within offshore wind installations.

(Image: Aker Energy)

(Reporting by Nerijus Adomaitis and Victoria Klesty, editing by Terje Solsvik and Louise Heavens)