Samson Investment Company is an upstream oil and gas company. Employees have to manage a large volume of data generated from evaluating well prospects, and it was difficult for them to find information in third-party solutions and data silos. Teams approached pre-drill workflows differently, and management had difficulty assessing global operations and coordinating drilling schedules. Samson addressed most of these issues with a knowledge management and collaboration solution based on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2. With streamlined access to consolidated data, Samson employees no longer spend a significant amount of time looking for information. Staff uses built-in scheduling logic to maximize efficiency to prepare the surface for rig move in and materials acquisition. Field labor costs are reduced by avoiding expedited location preparations.
Situation
Samson Investment Company was founded in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1971 by Charles Schusterman. It began operations with 20 employees and 30 wells. Today, it is the largest privately held producer of natural gas in the United States, employing more than 1,200 people and operating approximately 4,000 wells throughout the country.
Upstream oil and gas companies focus on finding and developing new reserves, with operations that cover exploration to drilling. Samson attributes its profitable pursuit of natural gas and crude oil to a highly motivated workforce, an abundance of in-house expertise and business acumen, and the innovative use of technology.
High Data Volume
Fifteen asset management teams at Samson work to evaluate prospects, perform pre-drill activities, and schedule rigs to “spud” or drill, a well. However, the sheer volume of information generated by the teams had become a bottleneck in efficient operations. While the company had invested in sophisticated third-party petrotechnical and seismic analysis solutions that generated large volumes of data, it had yet to find the right technology solution for its geologists, geophysicists, land managers, and engineers to take control of this information, including additional documents, maps, surveys, and contracts.
Samson needed an information management and collaboration solution that would be flexible enough to standardize and automate the asset teams’ different workflows, as well as to gather and consolidate data from various sources. The company also wanted to enable real-time collaboration to keep everyone up-to-date on rapidly changing developments in the field.
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We use E&P Net as a single repository for projects to efficiently manage the flux in our drilling schedules. Now the organization can stay abreast of changes and react in as expedient a manner as possible. |
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D.J. Ponville
Executive Vice President, Drilling and Operations,
Samson Investment Company |
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“Each asset team maintained its drilling opportunities in a spreadsheet that contained information about each prospect,” explains Tom Koscelny, Quality Control Manager at Samson Investment Company. “A prospect begins when a geologist decides to explore a geographic area to determine if it’s viable to acquire oil and gas leases to drill a well. We want to manage the process from conception, through negotiating leaseholds, through scientific and economic analyses of the opportunity, right up to the point when we schedule a rig to spud the well.”
Volatile Rig Schedules
It is the asset teams’ goal to ensure that rigs are scheduled to drill the most profitable opportunities first and as soon as they are ready. The logistics associated with drilling a well are complex. Regulatory permits have to be obtained. Locations have to be physically ready for a rig to move in, and materials for well construction have to be ordered and delivered in sync with rig movements. Significant costs are incurred if anything is out of sync. To schedule rigs and avoid cost overruns, Samson employees require an enterprise view of all the prospects under investigation by the 15 asset teams. However, because each team maintained its own spreadsheets and data silos, it was difficult to efficiently schedule all the rigs to work at optimal profitability.
“With information changing in the spreadsheets daily, we were constantly juggling the drilling schedules,” says Koscelny. “We would see some promising results come in for one prospect and move that up the schedule, and then the next day something would change and we would move another prospect up. We’ve had 25 versions of our drill schedule in different spreadsheets at a single time.”
To complicate matters, the asset teams worked with other Samson departments to acquire leases, ensure environmental regulatory compliance, and order materials for well construction. “One challenge the industry faces is managing the change associated with a dynamic drilling schedule that is inevitable given the nature of the business,” says D.J. Ponville, Executive Vice President, Drilling and Operations at Samson Investment Company. “While we are fortunate in that we have a dedicated workforce that is committed to doing whatever is necessary to adapt to the changes, this is an area we have long targeted for improvement. This is because the compressed planning cycles and potential communication lapses could compromise our ability to execute effectively and at the very least put undue pressure on the organization.”
Productivity Impact
When highly compensated professionals have to spend time searching for data, they are not being productive. Yet to gather the information they needed, Samson professionals could spend up to 20 percent of their time looking for information locked inside email messages, shared folders, and hard drives on individual’s computers. They had to search through 12 line-of-business applications and third-party products, including finance, drilling, well management, land management, geophysical analysis, risk management, and oil and gas economic evaluation software packages. They also had to consider data from a lease broker system and a land surface cost analysis solution.
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We didn’t want our business to adapt to the software; we wanted the software to adapt to our needs. Microsoft technologies offered the flexibility and interoperability that we needed. |
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Phillip Robinson
Land Manager, Samson Investment Company |
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“Because of the complex nature of the third-party applications, you almost had to be a trained expert in the software to go in and find the information you need,” says Phillip Robinson, Land Manager at Samson Investment Company. “Some asset teams had a technical assistant who would help gather the information, but we wanted more of a self-serve environment for our professionals.”
Limited Business Intelligence
Without a centralized data store and an enterprise content management solution complete with standard taxonomy, Samson management had a limited view into the business. It was difficult to compare progress status across asset teams and to archive pre-drill project information. With so much information hidden in personal computers or remaining locked inside people’s heads, the company couldn’t take full advantage of the collective expertise of its professionals.
All business units agreed that the company needed to find a better way to manage its pre-drill work processes and inventory of prospects to reduce costs and accelerate drilling time. To accomplish these goals, the company focused on an enterprise knowledge management and collaboration solution to build standardization and efficiency into each important stage of a well’s life cycle.
Solution
Samson Investment Company recognized that a solution built on Microsoft technologies would interoperate with its existing infrastructure. “We looked at off-the-shelf solutions, but none were dynamic or flexible enough to address our specific problems,” says Robinson. “We didn’t want our business to adapt to the software; we wanted the software to adapt to our needs. Microsoft technologies offered the flexibility and interoperability that we needed.”
Samson had deployed an intranet based on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 that a few asset teams used to collaborate on individual prospects. The company also used Microsoft SQL Server 2008 data management software to build a data warehouse. “We had the key components in place, so we needed a partner that could help us build a solution to extrapolate the benefits of our existing IT investments,” says Koscelny. “When our GIS [geographic information system] vendor, ESRI, recommended Idea Integration, we invited them to demonstrate a Microsoft-based solution that they had built for another company.”
Impressed by what Idea Integration had to offer, Samson began working with the Microsoft Gold Certified Partner in January 2009 to build and deploy a composite application that would streamline all pre-drill activities. Samson and Idea Integration developed E&P Net, a browser-based, collaborative portal that is built on Office SharePoint Server, which acts as a central document repository and currently houses 2,500 documents. E&P Net also uses SQL Server 2008 R2, including SQL Server 2008 Integration Services to pull data from 12 different line-of-business applications and SQL Server 2008 Reporting Services for reporting. E&P Net was built using the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5.
E&P Net showcases the Microsoft Silverlight 2 browser plug-in—a powerful development environment for creating engaging, interactive user experiences for the web. “To encourage user adoption, we wanted our knowledge management and collaboration solution to have an intuitive graphic user interface,” says Koscelny. “Idea Integration has expertise working with Silverlight as an application development framework, and when they demonstrated Silverlight in action, we were convinced by its speed, flexibility, and rich functionality.”
E&P Net uses Silverlight for all functionality, including interoperating with a GIS map interface that relates structured data and documents to a well’s geographic location using ArcGIS Server 9.3 from Microsoft Gold Certified Partner ESRI (Figure 1). “With E&P Net, we have gained a master system of records for all prospecting and well development activities, including geospatial document management, rig scheduling, approval processes, electronic notifications, and enterprise reporting,” says Koscelny. “All that integrated functionality delivered through a fast, engaging Silverlight-based user interface is what gives E&P Net its power.”
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Figure 1. With E&P Net, Samson staff gained instant access to information
on all prospecting and well development activities. The browser-based,
collaborative portal is built on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server technologies
and delivers a rich, interactive user interface based on Microsoft Silverlight. |
E&P Net helps to streamline common workflows. For example, to examine a prospect that is going to be drilled, an employee can open E&P Net and choose from a series of tabs. The map tab uses the Deep Zoom feature within Silverlight to zoom to a standard scale around the well site. By using the document tab, an employee can view all documents associated with a particular well or geographical area. To schedule a rig, an employee can drag wells to associate them with different rigs. The solution uses a sophisticated set of business rules to import current information about the well and calculate where it should be in the overall drilling schedule.
The team publicized E&P Net on the Samson intranet, performed a demo for company engineers, and released a video that featured screenshots of the graphical, map-driven user interface to drive interest. Samson launched the solution in March 2010. “We use E&P Net as a single repository for projects to efficiently manage the flux in our drilling schedules. Now the organization can stay abreast of changes and react in as expedient a manner as possible,” says Ponville. “I have been surprised by how quickly the organization has implemented the system and view that as a testimony to the need that was present. “
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Instead of people building reports manually from spreadsheets every week, we are using SQL Server Reporting Services to generate enterprise reports that have been extremely well received by the organization. |
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Phillip Robinson
Land Manager, Samson Investment Company |
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Adds Robinson, “Having our Chief Operations Officer on board from the start helped to build awareness of the solution. He knew our pain points and wanted to make E&P Net a success.”
In the six months since Samson deployed its knowledge management and collaboration solution, employees have adopted it almost universally. “The importance of this solution can be measured by how many people depend on it. Our technical staff uses E&P Net every day,” says Robinson. “Every member of the asset team—the land man, the geologist, the engineer, the geophysicist, the team manager—all use E&P Net as they collect, analyze, and share data. Other departments, including marketing, environmental, land, accounting, and purchasing, use it to support the asset teams as they move rigs into production.”
Benefits
As a result of deploying E&P Net, Samson Investment Company has streamlined operations, simplified data access, reduced operating costs, and improved business intelligence. And because E&P Net is built on interoperable Microsoft technologies, Samson has gained an extensible platform to cover all stages of a well’s life cycle. “Drilling wells is the core function of Samson, and since deploying E&P Net to manage our well life cycle, we’ve enhanced productivity and efficiency,” says Robinson.
More Efficient Operations
Samson employees can now work more efficiently through a coordinated, automated, and streamlined series of steps. These steps promote collaboration among Samson departments and greater collaboration means that Samson can move a well into production and start earning revenue faster.
One of the biggest timesavers for Samson employees is the drilling scheduler that maintains an up-to-the-minute drilling schedule based on data gleaned from all prospects. Employees use built-in alerts and electronic notifications within E&P Net to ensure that unforeseen mishaps and delays do not affect the forward momentum of pre-drill activities. “If we have a permit specification that says we can’t drill a well because of local wildlife issues, we can surface that information in E&P Net so that everyone knows about it, and we can make appropriate adjustments to our rig schedule,” explains Robinson. “Or, if we have to spud a well before a critical lease expiry date, the system will flash a red light to keep everyone aware of the impending deadline.”
With everyone following a normalized workflow, employees can transition between asset teams without having to relearn how things are done at each new location. “We like to tout employee portability within our organization because it’s a very dynamic work environment, and if people can be productive everywhere, it helps to promote business agility,” says Koscelny. “Now when we hire a professional, they get up-to-speed really quickly with E&P Net because everything they need to know is in one place.”
Using document-versioning capabilities within Office SharePoint Server, employees can ensure that all documents that are checked in and out of E&P Net are kept up-to-date. “Now everyone can stay on the same page with the most current information,” says Koscelny. “There’s no ‘churn’ while some people wait for others to find what they need and to confirm that everyone has the latest data so they can act upon it.”
Faster Access to Information
With a single entry point to 12 line-of-business applications, 2,500 stored documents, and a host of unstructured information, including email messages, Samson employees are enjoying easy access to the company’s rich data stores. This benefit has reduced the time they used to spend searching for information. “E&P Net has removed a lot of the complexity of the individual applications and data sources by surfacing what our professionals need to know in an uncomplicated way,” says Koscelny. “Now they don’t have to be experts in querying individual systems, they can use E&P Net to get the information they need in a way that’s meaningful to them.”
Reduced Costs
Staff uses E&P Net to avoid costly mistakes so that Samson can maintain healthy profit margins in a volatile business. For example, missing a critical date to get a well drilled could cost the company tens of thousands of dollars in leasehold payments. Relying on built-in alerts in E&P Net, staff can ensure that everything is done on time.
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We wanted more efficient upstream operations, but were years away. Microsoft technology allowed us to jump start the project. With Microsoft, you get the value without the learning curve. |
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Phillip Robinson
Land Manager, Samson Investment Company |
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Using Microsoft technologies to turn pre-drilling activities into a standard, routine process eliminates the costs associated with suddenly shifting wells up to a higher priority position on the drill schedule. “Our Executive Vice President for Drilling estimated that for every well that we fast tracked, we probably incurred an additional 20 percent of costs to prepare locations and acquire materials to make things happen at an accelerated rate. That adds up to millions of dollars,” says Robinson. “Now we are saving those dollars because we aren’t scrambling to accommodate as many last-minute changes. For example, if a well got moved from number eight to number two in the schedule and procurement wasn’t notified right away, then we would have to buy the right pipe for that rig at whatever the cost, and the money we spent on a different sized pipe for the rig that got bumped down the schedule is not going to be recouped for some time. The costs associated with these inefficiencies are now avoided.”
Improved Business Intelligence
Samson employees use Microsoft database technologies within E&P Net to analyze copious amounts of data that was previously unattainable for enterprise reporting. The result is better insight into all aspects of pre-drill activities. “Instead of people building reports manually from spreadsheets every week, we are using SQL Server Reporting Services to generate enterprise reports that have been extremely well received by the organization,” says Robinson. “Now they just hit a button and we have up-to-date data in real time.”
Employees in the drilling, land service, and gas marketing departments are also using reporting services in E&P Net to track their assets. They can generate reports for team meetings in seconds, rather than spending hours manually crunching numbers.
Not only is the company making better use of its information assets, but as more and more data is entered into the system, Samson is building a rich source of historical information that can be used to uncover best practices that can then be introduced across the organization. “One of our goals is to show at a granular level where our cost estimates are accurate and where they deviate from actual accounts to help us predict costs more accurately,” says Koscelny. “The more data we have in the solution, the better we can look back and see where we were spending too much money and fix that going forward.”
Extensible Well Life Cycle Platform
Now that Samson has experienced the benefits of Microsoft technologies combined with the technical expertise of an industry partner like Idea Integration, the company is eager to expand E&P Net to cover the entire well life cycle, from prospect to shut down. Already, the company is exploring the benefits of upgrading E&P Net to Silverlight 4 and SharePoint Server 2010 to expand the solution to help capture field data once a well is in production.
“We wanted more efficient upstream operations, but were years away,” concludes Robinson. “Microsoft technology allowed us to jump start the project. With Microsoft, you get the value without the learning curve. We now have an extensible platform to deliver more value across all areas of well asset management.”
Microsoft Solutions for the Manufacturing Industry
Manufacturing enterprises must compete in an increasingly global environment. Success depends on finding ever-greater efficiencies throughout the enterprise, while developing a greater agility to react to local and global market opportunities. These challenges are best answered with technology from Microsoft and its partners. Microsoft-based solutions offer much needed value to manufacturers who are under increasing pressure to generate greater returns on the assets that they have employed. This focus on efficiency scales across all the critical functional areas—from getting products to market faster, to streamlining the supply chain, optimizing the manufacturing operations, and generating new revenue streams.
For more information about Microsoft solutions for the manufacturing industry, go to:
www.microsoft.com/resources/manufacturing
For More Information
For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers in the United States and Canada who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:
www.microsoft.com
For more information about Idea Integration products and services, call (904) 360-2700 or visit the website at:
www.idea.com
For more information about Samson Investment Company products and services, call (918) 591-1791 or visit the website at:
www.samson.com
