Transforming into a real 21 century tech company NOW: as DW mentioned, we are essentially a tech company. The only way for XOM to come back is to enhance our already industry leading g R&D department and develop differentiating techniques and shift all low lever job in “business units” offshore. We hired the best PHDs from all areas and they are not replaceable as compared to engineers/technicians in the plants who just need to follow procedures.
7 replies (most recent on top)
Bro, WE ARE a technology company. that's what the top brass have been pitching for years. Think this might be the turning point we catch up to Apple with our B2B deal for payments at the retail fuel stations.
Name the last URC breakthrough. I can name a whole string of expensive failures.
Another PhD here. We've been R&D'ing the O&G space for decades - probably a hundred years. Everything worthwhile has already been found - there is not much that could make a real difference, especially compared with virgin space in new energy technologies. Good, conscientious researchers slave hard at the edge of irrelevance, and their output is sold as breakthroughs internally by management to further their own careers (externally no one takes us seriously unless we pay them to). We haven't hired top notch for a very long time, and those we do, go back to academia pretty quickly. It's just a lifecycle: our industry is dying of old age and exhaustion. Move on if you still can - while you still can.
The consultants are selling us the same magical solution that they’ve sold everyone else in our space.
PhD here. This is laughable. We sure do have some very excellent PhDs at the company. Their good work is usually twisted beyond recognition by key senior management folks for what they think is good PR. That behavior comes around and poisons the whole process. This has been happening for a long time and is only made worse by recent attempts at culture change. Most of the good researchers I know are chomping at the bit to get out of XOM. We haven’t been a tech company for a long time. Take a gander as our top “R&D” champion programs that are being paraded around. We’re just riding along on an old reputation of being major innovators while trying to ignore the fact that we’re essentially useless.
Here's to you DW, s_ck this:https://investorplace.com/2020/10/xom-stock-on-edge-of-irrelevance/
Thanks for visiting the site, Darren. You’ll find the feedback much more spirited than you’re used to.