INDUSTRY WATCH
LEADERS IN THE OIL
AND GAS INDUSTRY ARE
EMBRACING DIGITISATION
BECAUSE IT HELPS
THEM ADDRESS . . .
UNPLANNED DOWNTIME.
A
ccording to McKinsey, in its The
Impact of Digital on Unplanned
Downtime report, the energy
industry is poised for a new digital age
“that could further reduce costs, unleash
unparalleled productivity and boost
performance significantly - if executives
can harness the right technologies to
support their business strategy.”
Cost of downtime
and importance of
business continuity
One of the key reasons business and
technology leaders in the oil and
gas industry are fervently embracing
digitisation is because it helps them
address one of their most significant
challenges: unplanned downtime.
According to a study by Kimberlite,
offshore oil and gas operators experience
an average of US$38 million in financial
impacts due to unplanned downtime.
For the worst performers, the negative
financial impact could be upwards of
US$88 million.
By leveraging a predictive, data-
driven approach, organisations can
dramatically reduce downtime and drop
an average of US$34 million to the
bottom line each year.
The three steps necessary to
ensure business continuity in
oil and gas
As oil and gas companies continue
to embrace digital transformation,
they can’t afford availability or
www.intelligentcio.com
data protection gaps. If the flow of
information is stopped or delayed,
critical aspects of the business will come
to a standstill, impacting productivity,
morale, brand reputation and regulatory
compliance capabilities.
Fortunately, there are steps IT decision-
makers can take to close their availability
and data protection gaps.
First, as previously mentioned, is to
create and follow a viable business
continuity plan. Secondly, IT leaders can
invest in availability solutions that have
been designed to address the business
continuity challenges of today’s highly
virtualised and cloud-enabled oil and
gas environments.
Availability software is critical to
maintaining and preserving digital
life in the oil and gas industry. But
not all availability solutions deliver the
same level of functionality, reliability and
performance. In evaluating potential
availability solutions, IT decision-makers
should focus on three critical areas.
These are:
Ensuring continuity
and availability
Optimised backup and recovery
strategy: Every organisation should
follow the three-two-one best practices
guideline for data protection, which is:
• Maintain at least three copies of
your data
• Store data on at least two different
types of storage media
INTELLIGENTCIO
89