Tullow Oil will put its plans in Mauritania on hold to review data from what Exploration Director Angus McCoss said Friday was a bold effort in a frontier area.

Tullow, which has headquarters in London, announced it came up empty at it Tapendar-1 exploration well off the coast of Mauritania. The company said it has a major stake in offshore developments in the country, though Tapendar-1 is its second disappointment this year.

McCoss said his company was trying to replicate the success of major discoveries found nearby off the coast of Ghana, where the Jubilee field could eventually produce more than 125,000 barrels of oil per day for Tullow.

The Tapendar-1 frontier exploration well was a "bold attempt" to open up new oil reserves in what he said was a highly prospective area.

"Following these opening wells, we and our partners will now pause to analyze the data gathered from the exploration campaign thus far," he said in a statement Friday. "We will then decide on the location and timings of the next wells which will continue to focus on exploring for conventional oil plays."

The U.S. Energy Information Agency ranks Mauritania 73rd in the world in terms of crude oil production.