- BUCHAREST, Romania (Bloomberg) -- Gazprom and Italy's Eni were among eight companies that bid for Romania's SNP Petrom, the biggest Central European oil company to be sold since the fall of communism, as demand for fuel increases in the region.

ConocoPhillips, the third-biggest U.S. oil company, and Alon Inc. did not submit preliminary bids for a 51 percent stake valued at more than $1 billion, Economy Minister Dan Popescu said at a briefing in Bucharest on Monday. Petrom produces 60 percent of the oil used in Romania and controls 28 percent of the retail fuel market.

Occidental Petroleum Corp., Glencore International AG, Hellenic Petrol SA, Mol, OMV and PKN all submitted preliminary bids. BP's Russian venture, TNK-BP, dropped out of the bidding earlier this month. A joint bid led by Halliburton Co. was rejected in October. The elimination of ConocoPhillips and TNK-BP "doesn't at all make the process less attractive," Popescu said. "Any of the eight companies left in the race are major players. Petrom's privatization will be a success given the size and reputation of bidders involved."

Petrom at about $357 per ton of refining a purchase price of $1 billion would value capacity. Mol this year paid $404 per ton for 25 percent of INA, Croatia's state-owned refiner.

Romania's advisers, Credit Suisse Group and ING Barings, will review the proposals to ensure they comply with bidding guidelines. Final bids are due at the end of February, one week later than originally planned. The government expects to complete the sale by March 31.

Petrom is Romania's biggest company, with 60,000 workers and $2.2 billion in sales. Net income fell 16 percent to 2.28 trillion lei ($69 million) last year. The government owns 93 percent of Petrom, and the remaining shares are publicly traded.

The company extracts more than 6 million metric tons of crude per year and has 128 million metric tons of reserves. U.S. companies are looking for new sources of crude to reduce their reliance on the Middle East.

Central Europe's pipeline connections to Russian oil fields, dating to the era when the countries were part of the communist Comecon trading block, are also attracting Russian companies looking for an outlet for their crude.