US-based GE Oil and Gas has signed a US$500 million ($475.26 million) contract with Brazil's Petrobras to supply the largely state-owned oil giant with equipment and machinery for its deep water offshore oil platforms.

The equipment will be for four new platforms in the Santos basin off the state of Sao Paulo to tap oil deposits trapped deep below the ocean surface under thick layers of bedrock and salt.

Petrobras, which confirmed the contract with GE Oil and Gas, extracts most of Brazil's two million barrel a day production. The company is 64 per cent owned by the state.