Factbox - Profile of Korea National Oil Corp

SEOUL (Reuters) - State-run Korea National Oil Corp (KNOC) is set to make a hostile $2.6 billion (1.7 billion pound) bid for Dana Petroleum Plc, a source said, reflecting South Korea's growing urgency to boost oil reserves.

This ranks as the biggest takeover attempt by a South Korean state firm.

Following is a profile of KNOC, including its recent overseas energy investments:

WHO IS KNOC?

Anyang, Gyeonggido-based KNOC is the national oil company which mainly invests in overseas oil exploration and production businesses, while running strategic oil storage businesses for South Korea, the world's No.5 crude oil importer.

The state-run entity was established in 1979 to secure stable oil supplies after the oil crisis of the 1970s.

South Korea hopes to boost the country's daily oil production capacity six-fold to 300,000 barrels by 2012 through KNOC and reserves to two billion barrels. Output at the end of 2009 reached 130,000 bpd, up from 50,000 bpd when the country started the expansion drive in June 2008.

South Korea, through KNOC, also aims to build 141 million barrels of strategic oil stocks by 2013, with 101 million barrels to be held by the government and the remainder as international cooperative stocks.

Kang Young-won is KNOC's chief executive. Kang spent more than three decades with the now defunct Daewoo Group and helped Daewoo International win a $5.6 billion gas development deal in Myanmar while serving as its CEO until 2008.

KNOC'S RECENT DEALS

Last December, KNOC bought Kazakh oil developer Sumbe for $335 million. Under the deal, KNOC and its Kazakh partner acquired 85 percent and 15 percent, respectively, of Sumbe which owns two oilfields in western Kazakhstan.

KNOC agreed to pay C$1.8 billion ($1.7 billion) last October for a friendly takeover of Canada's Harvest Energy Trust and assume C$2.3 billion of long-term debt.

KNOC had narrowly lost out to Chinese oil giant Sinopec in a bid for Swiss-based oil explorer Addax Petroleum Corp in 2009.

In February 2009, KNOC paid half of the $900 million price tag for a 50 percent stake in Petro-Tech, owned by private U.S. firm Offshore International Group.

KNOC and its partner in January 2008 acquired crude oil fields in the Gulf of Mexico with 60 million barrels of oil reserves and 17,000 barrels per day production, paying $1.15 billion.

(Reporting by Cho Mee-young; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)