$re = '/(?<= |^)(([\w\d_]+) : ([A-Za-z0-9-]+(?= )|(\d*[)( -])*\d+|[A-Za-z0-9-_.]+@[A-Za-z0-9-_.]+\.[A-Za-z]+(?= ))?) ?/';
$str = 'bypass_first_page : x_company : x_cust_id : 12345 x_customer_ip : x_customer_tax_id : x_description : 98765 x_duty : x_email_customer : an_example@example.com x_fax : x_footer_email_receipt : x_fp_hash : 747ffeddfe4e106a9c67363ebff996ad x_fp_timestamp : 1525100766 x_invoice_num : R000098765 x_login : MY-LOGIN-ID x_logo_url : x_merchant_email : x_method : x_phone : (416) 555-1212 x_po_num : x_receipt_link_method : GET x_reference_3 : 1234 x_relay_response : TRUE x_relay_url : ';
$subst = "[\2] => \3\n";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$result;
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php