Oil & Gas and Energy
Open Options’ unique process and proprietary game theory software have helped guide senior executives in the oil & gas and energy industries across six continents since 1996. We work with executives at super majors, majors and smaller oil & gas firms as they tackle their toughest commercial and geopolitical issues, often in challenging foreign jurisdictions. We have also helped utilities and other companies in the energy sector deal with their significant business decisions.
What Does Open Options Do?
- We challenge executives to stretch their thinking and to look at issues differently by explicitly considering the perspectives and motivations of the critical parties involved in the issue
- We provide an effective, structured process to capture organizational knowledge
- We analyze that structured knowledge using proprietary game theory tools to explore the potential competitive strategies and the millions of ways the issue could play out
- We provide a practical action plan to reach the best attainable outcome for our client
- We build deep management consensus and trust on the best path forward
Our Process
Our efficient process consists of five steps:
- Define the Issue
- Harvest Organizational Knowledge
- Determine Players, Options and Preferences
- Reveal Insights with Game Theory Analysis
- Deliver a Trusted Decision and Action Plan
Our Experience
We have worked with some of the largest oil & gas and energy companies around the globe, on projects spanning the following application areas:
- Partnerships and joint ventures
- Production sharing agreements, joint operating agreements
- Dealing with NOCs and foreign governments
- Accelerating project approval with partners
- Regulatory approvals
- Major asset sales and spin-offs
- Crisis Management
- Corporate alignment between divisions
- Indigenous people’s land claims
- Emissions compliance and land disputes
- Competitive demand/supply strategies
- Upstream and downstream issues
- Pricing Strategy
- Auctions and Tenders
Related Clients
Case Study Descriptions
Below is a selected list of some of our success stories in the oil & gas and energy industries. Please contact us to learn more about our process and to review a relevant case study.
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Joint Venture Partner Alignment – "Briar Patch” Show more
A major oil and gas company wanted to develop a new multi-billion dollar greenfield site and it was not clear whether to seek a co-operative project with JV partners or to proceed stand-alone. Complicating matters further was internal disagreement within the company’s leadership on what should be done.
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Managing Schedule Pressure and Regulators – “Course Correction” Show more
A large natural resources company required a series of approvals for a multi-billion dollar project from government and project partners in a short time frame. The government and its regulatory agencies were pushing their preferred local contractors, and the client and its JV partners were not aligned on how to respond.
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Joint Venture Partner Alignment – “Good Cop/Bad Cop” Show more
An oil and gas company was trying to advance a JV project toward development but was concerned that the local government would make unreasonable demands, thereby rendering the project uneconomic. The Client wanted to determine its most effective strategy to secure favorable terms and a commitment to the project from its JV partner.
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Carbon Sequestration – “It’s a Gas” Show more
An oil and gas company wanted to respond to social and political pressures to control CO2 emissions through carbon sequestration. It also had an economic opportunity to recover large amounts of incremental oil from legacy fields through CO2 injection. Both of these objectives required a mechanism to transport the CO2 from the source location to an injection site. The Client wanted to determine its most effective strategy to address its need to transport CO2.
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Redevelopment Permits – “Seeing Green” Show more
A major oil and gas company was looking to repurpose a mothballed operation in the extensively regulated state of California. The Client wanted to know what actions would lead to a reasonable chance of obtaining the permits for redevelopment.
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Civil Unrest – “Under Attack” Show more
A large oil and gas company was facing challenges to its ability to operate in a politically unstable country due to insurgency and crime that was inadvertently being supported by other foreign firms. The Client wanted to know what actions to take to preserve its assets in this militarized and politically unstable environment.
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Pricing Strategy – “Fire a Warning Shot” Show more
A utility was looking to anticipate competitive reactions and to create pricing strategies that would halt the loss of customers. They wanted to grow market share without triggering a price war but feared higher commodity prices and price aggression by competitors.
What Makes Us Unique
As experts and specialists in solving business issues where multiple players can influence the final outcome, Open Options is unique in several ways:
