The implementation of the 20 PSA contracts (requiring $60 billion investment) that have been concluded so far is an integral part of Azerbaijan‘s oil strategy. Azeri, Chirag and deep-water Gunashli (ACG)-International Contract No. 1 was signed by President Heydar Aliyev and the participating international companies on September 20, 1994, ratified in Parliament on December 2, and went into effect on December 12. Because of its potential reserves estimated at 6 billion barrels (950,000,000 m3) of oil, this project is often referred to as the „Contract of the Century“. The projected investment for this project is $13 billion.

A few months later in 1995, a consortium was organized known as the Azerbaijan International Operating Company (AIOC). Originally AIOC was composed of eleven major international companies: BP (UK), Amoco (U.S.), LUKoil (Russia), Pennzoil, (now Devon of U.S.), UNOCAL (U.S.), Statoil (Norway), McDermott (U.S.), Ramco (Scotland), TPAO (Turkey), Delta Nimir (now Amerada Hess of U.S.), and SOCAR (Azerbaijan).

Since then Exxon, now ExxonMobil (U.S.); ITOCHU (Japan); and INPEX (Japan) have joined the consortium. McDermott, Ramco and LUKoil have since sold their shares. AIOC‘s first president was Terry Adams (UK) of British Petroleum (BP), the company which operates the offshore oil platforms and the onshore Sangachal Terminal.

However, the problem of how to deliver the oil to European markets existed. This problem was solved by the agreement for the construction of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline among Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey in 1998.

The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline was officially opened on July 13, 2006 and now transports crude oil 1,760 km (1,090 mi) from the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli oil field in the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. The oil is pumped from the Sangachal Terminal close to Baku, via Tbilisi the capital of Georgia, to Ceyhan a port on the south-eastern Mediterranean coast of Turkey. It is the second longest oil pipeline in the world (the longest being the Druzhba pipeline from Russia to central Europe).