Norway’s Aker Bets On Software Engineers for Its Oil Business
By Shadia Nasralla and also Gwladys Fouche STAVANGER, Norway, Sept 19 (Reuters)– When the proprietors of Norwegian oil company Aker BP chose to digitise its possessions and also procedures, they looked high and also reduced for the best software application business. But they stopped working to locate an ideal one.
So rather they established their very own, Cognite https://www.cognite.com, to produce electronic maps of Aker BP’s oil sector possessions, incorporating information from devices such as pumps, warmth and also stress sensing units, upkeep documents and also also personnel rotas to boost effectiveness and also safety and security.
Less than 2 years later on, Cognite is marketing its software application to Aker BP’s competitors and also one rival, Sweden’s Lundin Petroleum, has actually also consented to share its real-time oilfield information with Aker in what they state is a sector initially.
“This will be the first time two different operators, or oil companies, will share operations/production data live from two producing fields, that is between Edvard Grieg and Ivar Aasen,” a Lundin Norway depictive informed Reuters.
By integrating all the information that usually beings in various electronic silos– such as matching circulation sensing units with the item of equipment they really rest on– Cognite claims its software application can help in reducing upkeep expenses, expand the life-span of devices and also stay clear of destructive malfunctions.
Digitising commercial possessions can likewise imply less individuals require to be offshore, much less downtime for oil systems, even more targeted upkeep and also far better evaluation of details such as geological information and also shutoff stress.
For Lundin Petroleum, sharing details from its Edvard Grieg area on the Norwegian continental rack with Aker BP’s surrounding Ivar Aasen area makes good sense due to the fact that obtaining much more real-time manufacturing information from a competitor in a comparable geological location might aid it boost its very own oil outcome.
“Aker BP’s view is that, unlike seismic data interpretation for oil exploration, operational data is not a strategic know-how to be protected,” claimed its principal Karl Johnny Hersvik.
For Aker ASA, the greatest investor in Aker BP and also Cognite, the Lundin Petroleum offer becomes part of its strategy to produce software application for a sector that can be boosted and also fine-tuned the much more it obtains made use of by various customers– instead of simply concentrating on an internal version for Aker BP.
“The value that Cognite’s technology brings to the Aker companies will increase with the number of customers Cognite serves,” Aker Chief Executive Oeyvind Eriksen informed Reuters.
Aker ASA, which along with Aker BP has greater than 75 percent of Cognite, is also thinking about drifting the business on the stock market within 2 years.
Controlled by Norwegian billionaire Kjell Inge Roekke https://eng.akerasa.com/About-Aker/Board, Aker likewise has passions in oil, design and also building solutions along with angling.
‘THAT’ S RIDICULOUS’
John Markus Lervik, a software application designer that established Cognite, claimed it has actually expanded from simply 2 individuals to concerning 110 in 18 months, has customers in oil and also delivery and also is just intending 12-months in advance in the meantime due to the fact that “things are happening so quickly”.
It may appear counterproductive to share technical proficiency with competitors, however by picking up from use throughout business and also sectors, software application can be boosted– also if no oilfield details information is traded. Improvements can after that be presented to customers, consisting of Aker BP.
“To provide the algorithm and the software to be able to map or connect sensors to the right equipment, that’s a big challenge all oil companies and also other companies have,” Lervik claimed.
“The more companies we work with to create advanced algorithms to do this mapping, the more advanced, the more automatic, that mapping will be.”
While Cognite is not the only one in establishing systems that can connect masses of information traditionally maintained in various systems, Alfonso Velosa at technology consultatory company Gartner https://www.gartner.com/en believes when it involves oil and also gas, Aker is out in front in the meantime.
“Those systems tended to be stuck in proprietary legacy systems and this is now an approach that is trying to marry (them) together,” he claimed.
“This is a trend that’s coming down and they’re just ahead of the trend at the moment in the oil sector.”
Other business seeking to bring countless information factors with each other in the oil market consist of Eigen http://www.eigen.co, a software application company in the United Kingdom established by oil and also gas designers.
Chief technique policeman Gareth Davies claimed a brand-new generation of individuals getting in the oil and also gas sector is partially behind the drive ahead up with far better electronic systems.
“The guys who come in now who are in their 20s expect to have the information,” claimed Davies.
“It’s like, well you have to go to that system, you have to ask him to log in there and he’ll export it here, and they look at you like: What are you talking about? That’s ridiculous.”
In among its current tasks, Eigen electronically linked 10,600 sensing units on Italian oil business ENI’s Goliat http://www.eninorge.com/en/Field- growth/Goliat/Development- remedy/The- system– FPSO drifting manufacturing, storage space and also offloading (FPSO) device, the globe’s most northern oilfield in manufacturing.
The system combines gas and also stress discovery to avoid crashes and also fire detectors, lawn sprinklers and also extinguisher systems, emptying strategies, life watercrafts and also various other information right into one stream of incorporated details.
“Up until now this would have been done through a monthly report,” Davies claimed. “You don’t want to know it every month, you want to know now.” (Additional coverage by Nerijus Adomaitis; editing and enhancing by David Clarke)
( c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2018.