All Posts

For decades, offshore logistics has been treated as a support function in the oil and gas industry. However, for E&P operators managing mature offshore assets and new deepwater developments, logistics has emerged as one of the most significant determinants of operating cost, production continuity, asset utilization, and safety performance. Having closely witnessed offshore logistics operations for over sixteen years across marine logistics, helicopter services, shore-base man

Capital discipline in upstream oil and gas has moved from being a finance function to a board-level control. In India, that shift is sharper because the opportunity set is expanding at the same time as project complexity is rising. The policy direction is clear. India Hydrocarbon Outlook 2026, DGH and MoPNG reporting, Samudra Manthan, HELP, OALP X and XI, ORDA 2025 and PNG Rules 2025, NDR 2.0, Mission Anveshan and the National Seismic Programme all point towards one broad amb

The Field Development Plan has become the board paper behind the barrel. For E&P operators, lenders, joint venture partners, and regulators, it is no longer a technical attachment to an investment case. It is the central decision document that proves whether a discovery can be developed safely, economically, and in line with the host country’s policy direction. In India, that expectation is rising fast. The Latest policy guidance and DGH outlook point to a more active upstrea

Cost governance in upstream E&P are not effective when approval, evidence, and accountability do not move at the same speed as field operations. That risk is high where operators, non-operators, vendors, auditors, and regulators all sit inside a contract-driven environment. CAPEX and OPEX decisions must stand up to internal review, joint venture scrutiny, and regulatory examination. A strong framework reduces disputes, protects cost recovery, and gives management a clear vie

Mortgage underwriting often begins with a simple question, “Is this applicant eligible?” The answer should be quick, clear, and consistent. In practice, it can take far longer than expected. A loan officer may calculate EMI, check FOIR, compare bank policies, review documents, read PDFs, ask for missing papers, prepare a summary, and then send the case for the next round of review. Each step is small. Together, they slow down the mortgage journey and leave room for manual mis

Annual budgets in Indian exploration and production are no longer simple planning files. They now sit at the centre of regulatory review, PSC cost recovery, joint venture discussion, statutory reporting, and board oversight. For an upstream operator, a weak budget is more than a forecasting problem. It can delay approvals, create cost recovery disputes, invite audit observations, and weaken partner confidence. A strong budget, by contrast, gives management a clear basis for s

Picking a model feels like the big decision. It is not. A capable model can write, reason, call tools, summarise documents, and inspect data. But a production agent needs much more than a good brain. It needs a way to act, remember, fetch facts, use tools safely, pass tasks to other systems, and prove that it did the job well. That is where most agent builds fail. The demo works because the path is clean. The production version breaks because the world is messy: missing permi

A vessel contract can look commercially acceptable on award day and still leak money from the first mobilisation call. The risk usually sits in a few lines of wording: when hire starts, what counts as standby, who carries weather delays, how performance is measured, and what evidence supports an invoice. For E&P operators, offshore support vessels are not just marine assets. They are part of the drilling, construction, inspection, logistics, and emergency response chain. An O

An offshore support vessel ( Offshore Supply Vessel /Platform Supply Vessel/Anchor Handling Tug cum Supply) hereinafter singularly referred as OSV may look like a single line item in a field budget, but the day rate behind it carries several moving parts. Vessel class, fuel treatment, mobilisation distance, port delays, technical specification, crew terms, market tightness and contract risk all show up in the final number. That is why OSV day rate benchmarking is not a quick

A drilling budget rarely breaks in one dramatic moment. It usually drifts. A rig waits on materials for half a day. A service ticket comes in with standby time that nobody challenged. Mud losses continue longer than planned. Logistics costs climb because the forecast changed after mobilisation. By the time the finance team sees the full picture, the overrun has already moved from operational noise to a board-level issue. For upstream finance leaders, drilling OPEX is one of t

A high-cost upstream operation rarely becomes expensive in one dramatic moment. It usually happens through hundreds of small decisions: a rig contract rolled over without a fresh benchmark, low-value consumables bought on urgent POs, standby vessels kept “just in case”, and projects approved before their cost basis is mature. By 2026, E&P cost pressure is no longer only about surviving a price downturn. Operators have to fund drilling, maintain ageing fields, meet tighter emi

Offshore drilling does not lose money only through one bad decision. It leaks through waiting time, unclear scopes, late materials, repeated tool runs, poor vessel planning, weak invoice checks, and assumptions that nobody revisits once the rig is on hire. The challenge is that many of these losses look normal. A supply boat waits outside port. A rig remains on standby for a weather window. A vendor crew arrives before the equipment clears customs. A batch of casing reaches t

Deep sea discoveries can look attractive on a map and fragile in a spreadsheet. The distance from shore, high-pressure reservoirs, complex subsea systems, long supply chains, and fiscal exposure can turn a technically sound Field Development Plan into a capital-heavy project that struggles at sanction. A strong FDP cannot be only a facilities concept with a cost estimate attached. It must show why the selected development route is the best use of capital under realistic reser

Finance cost in upstream oil and gas is not just an interest line in the profit and loss account. In an SAP environment, it can move through projects, wells, fields, assets under construction, joint venture partners, inventory, and finally the P&L. If the cost flow is not designed well, the accounts may look neat in SAP but fail the substance test under ICAI principles. This post explains How Finance Cost is allocated in Upstream Oil and Gas SAP and ICAI Guidance Explained fr

A barrel of offshore crude begins its journey long before steel touches the seabed. It starts as a signal, reflected from rock layers kilometres below the ocean floor, then moves through years of geoscience, drilling, well construction, production operations, processing, storage, and export. Offshore oil production is often described by its biggest objects: rigs, platforms, FPSOs, and tankers. Yet the real story sits in the links between them. A seismic survey is only useful

A deepwater rig may drill rock, but logistics drills the balance sheet. When a rig sits 500+ nautical miles from Kakinada or Chennai, every late container, every extra sailing, every standby hour, and every weather delay becomes Marine OPEX. At ultra-deepwater distance, the old pattern of direct, point-to-point supply from the mainland starts to fail. India’s ₹84,084 crore Sagar Manthan mission raises the stakes. The Eastern Coast and Andaman basins are not simply farther off

Many offshore companies are racing to ask, “Which AI tool should we adopt?” That is the wrong starting point. The better question is sharper and far less comfortable: If an AI system entered the operation today, would it find clarity or chaos? Offshore assets already run under pressure. Weather windows are tight. Equipment is ageing. Skilled people are hard to replace. Downtime is expensive. Safety leaves no room for guesswork. In that setting, AI can look like the next big a

When I look back at my original 1996–98 project — “Technical Analysis of Select 35 Scrips with EPS > 10 and P/E < 10” — I am reminded of a very different world of computing. A world where: Stock data was downloaded from NSE/BSE in text files Charts were drawn manually or using Lotus 1-2-3 / early Excel Technical indicators were coded using BASIC, FoxPro, or early C Internet speeds were measured in kbps, not Mbps And “automation” meant writing a macro that didn’t crash Yet, de

In today's fast-paced and dynamic business environment, the adoption of advanced AI technologies is revolutionizing the field of logistics. From streamlining operations to enhancing efficiency, AI is reshaping the way companies manage their supply chains and transportation networks. Maritime Logistics Framework The global maritime industry underpins international trade, transporting over 80% of world cargo by volume and functioning as the backbone of modern supply chains. Its