New York, July 15, 2008-Stockhouse reports that Chaparral Energy, Inc., a privately held company, and Edge Petroleum Corporation (Nasdaq:EPEX) (Nasdaq:EPEXP) today jointly announced that they have entered into a definitive merger agreement that provides for Chaparral to acquire Edge in an all-stock transaction. Through the merger, Chaparral will become a publicly traded company.

The boards of directors of both companies have unanimously approved the merger agreement. The transaction will remain subject to Edge stockholder approval and other customary closing conditions. Chaparral's stockholders have already voted in favor of the merger.

Chaparral stockholders will own approximately 86 percent of the outstanding common stock of the combined company and Edge stockholders will own approximately 14 percent of the outstanding common stock of the combined company. The common stock of the combined company is expected to begin trading under the symbol "CPR" once the transaction is closed

As of December 2007 the combined entities had 1.15 trillion feet of equivalent in reserves.

The combined company becomes a larger player in finding, extracting and marketing new land based energy reserves.

As of this report Edge Petroleum was up over 24% and had traded over one million shares.