The swift movement to digital technologies driven by the pandemic is anticipated to continue well into and beyond the COVID-19 recovery period. Organisations across industries globally are enhancing digital capabilities to keep the pace.
In a recent Global Consumer Insights Survey published by PwC leaning heavily on coronavirus-related data, research conducted with respondents pre-outbreak and post-outbreak indicated that 74% of survey respondents now worked from home at least some of the time, 59% had increased their use of video chats and notably, 49% were willing to share their data if it resulted in improvements to their city.
Upstream online reported that the share price of the video conferencing company Zoom more than doubled since early 2020, as social distancing set in globally, while daily users of Microsoft Teams rose from 44 million to 75 million between April and May.
The shift in behaviour has motivated organisations to innovate and accelerate digitalisation efforts not only to improve internal processes but in improving services and touch points with consumers and businesses.
In the context of the oil and gas industry, in order to remain competitive during the pandemic-driven downturn, work accelerated to leverage on digital transformation technologies.
“The (oil and gas industry) was already on the journey, with the digital twin, Industry Revolution 4.0, moves to hire chief digital officers and chief technology officers to act as catalysts for these digital projects, and they have had good successes around freeing up operational efficiencies,” says software giant Aveva’s chief executive Craig Hayman in a recent Upstream article.
“What we found is that Covid-19 really acted as a catalyst for digital transformation… The industrial sector is going through a digitalisation curve, increasingly using more digital technology than it has done before..”
Companies are also employing their technologies toward advancing efforts in combating the pandemic. UK supermajor BP announced in mid-April that it was donating supercomputing capability to a research consortium that includes IBM, the US Department of Energy and the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy.
Engineering consultant SynergenOG has joined the ranks of oil and gas giants not only in adapting to the challenging environment but in introducing technological solutions that benefit the industry. Working in collaboration with Caspian Digital Solutions, the process safety specialist has introduced The Action Tracking System (ACTSYN) that gives engineers an online dashboard to consolidate actions for all studies/sources to track the status of each and every action in safety assessment procedures on an oil rig. It is also helpful in generating reports for easy understanding of management for each action.
SynergenOG is investing towards developing a range of modelling, monitoring and reporting tools by using an integrated digital technology 4.0 approach. We envision a future of enhanced efficiency, stronger inter-team collaboration, more accurate outcomes and recommendations, and improve communication with all stakeholders.
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SynergenOG aims to continuously help clients solve their engineering challenges by connecting design and operations, evaluating real issues and developing meaningful solutions to improve safety to personnel and production efficiency.
Sources : Upstream Online, associationnow.com, pwc.com,