Listen in as we speak with Ron Beck from Aspen Technology and Prabu Parthasarthy from Wood Automation and Control on In the Oil Patch Radio Show.
Kym Bolado: So, if you’re an executive in the upstream, and you’re to cut costs and maintain financial strength, the big question is why would you move towards digitalization in the oil fields now? Well, why would you not? And, how could you not? This is actually where saving your company and using your dollars is the most wisest and efficient. So tell me, why should they not wait a year?
Ron Beck: Think about it. So now you’re cutting half of your production in an oil field or a gas field, and you’re using the infrastructure that’s there. You don’t want the people in the oil fields because you’re risking them getting sick and also it’s expensive to have them in the oil field. You know? So, what are your questions as an executive? If I make this decision, what is that going to do to my equipment? Is it going to keep running? How long can I run it without putting the maintenance people out in the field? You’re creating so much financial uncertainty without knowing the answers quickly. So you have to invest in the digital tools.
Kym Bolado: I want to give our listeners an understanding of who you are and how you connect into the specialized fields. So, tell us a little bit about yourself and then of course the Wood Group, which by the way … the Wood Group has been featured in past years in SHALE Magazine, but obviously with a lot of changes occurring. It’d be interesting to see the Wood Group in its current form.
Prabu Parthasarathy: I came to Houston from India about 24 years back, did my PHD here at the University of Houston. My first job was with a company which was acquired by Wood Group in 2004. So I’ve been in my first job for the last 18 years, enjoying it, and have moved up the organization through various transitions that have taken place. Wood Group, as you know, in the early to late 2000s was acquiring a lot of companies in the energy sector. A lot of acquisitions through the growth of the subsea offshore market. And over the last six or seven years there’s been a consolidation mode where a lot of different systems put together single branding. Part of that would diversify it from being a sort of 90% upstream focused company to today being about 50% option focus, or oil and gas focused. So there’s a sector diversification. We’re in minor now, for example, we were nuclear in a recent divestment evade. So many sectors that we are thought of now. It plays such a major role. Fifty percent of our business is now oil and gas.Â