Austria-based integrated oil and gas company OMV ad Norway-based exploration and development company Aker BP have committed to share digitalization competencies and technology across borders and advancing both companies’ digital agendas.
Together, through a newly agreed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), the two companies will collaborate on projects that explore how to set up and execute wide-scale digital transformation processes.
Aker BP will share best practices from Eureka, their digital transformation program that started two years ago. These insights will advance the digital maturity of OMV Upstream and also benefit a wide range of suppliers and partners connected to OMV’s operations. In turn, OMV will share the insights from its digitalization program DigitUP to advance the digital transformation of Aker BP.
The firms are also planning joint collaboration and technology projects within the areas of operational efficiency, drilling and subsurface that will involve agile ways of co-developing use cases and advancing technology together with Norwegian technology company Cognite.
In addition to the MOU, OMV also formally entered into a long-term agreement with Cognite to partner in its digital transformation process.
As Aker BP’s technology partner for the past two years, Cognite has helped Aker BP with its digital transformation and delivered measureable bottom line results. Cognite is providing foundational digital twins for all Aker BP’s operations, and with the support of Cognite’s data contextualization software Cognite Data Fusion, Aker BP’s digital transformation program has increased worker safety and improved worker efficiency, reduced maintenance costs, and optimized production across installations.
Deployment of Cognite Data Fusion will enable OMV to operationalize data analytics and machine learning and to roll it out across their operations, integrating seamlessly with existing infrastructure to make all relevant data instantly available as a comprehensive set in the cloud. By harnessing the data stored in Cognite Data Fusion to power its digital transformation agenda, OMV will be able to easily monitor critical machinery, move from scheduled to predictive maintenance, increase production, and improve its HSSE operations.
By collaborating with Aker BP and Cognite, OMV joins the Data Liberation Front, a movement building momentum in the oil and gas industry, and other asset heavy industries. Data liberation is about breaking data free from silo systems and empowering humans and machines to make better and more informed decisions, and to seamlessly exchange data between companies across an industrial value chain for improved efficiency.
“The future of the oil and gas industry is digital. OMV is committed to leading the change as a digital frontrunner together with Aker BP and Cognite,” said Johann Pleininger, Executive Board member responsible for Upstream and Deputy Chairman of OMV.
“We are excited to partner with OMV to advance digitalization across the industry. Our experiences with Eureka highlight how liberated, contextualized data can help companies optimize production, reduce costs, and increase worker safety. And as our work with Cognite shows, finding the right technology partner is an integral part of that digital transformation process,” said Karl Johnny Hersvik, CEO of Aker BP.
“The partnership between Aker BP and OMV sends a signal to the rest of the industry to be more open and collaborative,” said John Markus Lervik, CEO of Cognite AS. “Aker BP and OMV are both strong supporters of data liberation and data sharing in the industry and are joining forces in transforming the oil & gas industry toward increased efficiency, safety and reliability.“