What’s the endgame? Why have two TC when BTC is lower cost ?
7 replies (most recent on top)
Perhaps KLTC will be shut down when Malaysia is finally sold. I’d agree there is no need for KLTC and BTC..
You are all wrong. The KLTC started out as a small experiment for EMRE and Downstream 10 years ago. It was put in KL because upstream had an office there so it was cheap and easy to setup. We had nothing already standing in India. A few people from the Port Dixon refinery which XOM went there.
This was before we had anything in India. The office has expanded far from the original experiment. Upstream decided KL was a bad idea and went to India instead.
Where it ends up who knows. You can make a strong case to shutdown KL and consolidate in India.
Ha beat down BTC:
- For racist reasons, and
- For the mere reason that it’s employees are incompetent, have low intellect given they are from the worst educational institutes and lack passion for anything other than $$s.
How racist!!!!!
KLTC has a talent pool drawn from operating oil and gas production production facilities of EMEPMI. It also recruited region-wide from Indonesia and Brunei where there are active upstream operations. That will put them in advantaged position on Reservoir engineering, static equipment/piping, process/surveillance engineering, corrosion and inspection and flow assurance.
India has big refineries and manufacturing basis but not much of upstream oil and gas operations. BTC can sufficiently support Machinery, I&C and Electrical area, may be some Digital Transformation initiatives, with Bangalore being the high growth area for IT industries. It will be a struggle for new hire BTC grad-engineers to support remote assets where they have no direct experience with.
I have worked with (or trained) people at both KLTC and BTC. Some (but not many) young engineers at KLTC are very talented. Maybe this is a culture thing but I can see clearly that those at BTC are not fit for remote manufacturing support.
KLTC is a hedge against the impact of 1000’s of smelly armpits on productivity
diversification. never put all your eggs in one basket
in 10 years' time, if the real wages at BTC becomes more expensive because economy grows at a much faster pace, but real wages KLTC stays stagnant at today's level because that country's politicians are still so corrupt, then start shifting more work to KL. Exxon benefits from the cheap and already experienced workforce in KL.
on the other hand if India remains ever so cheap, then they would have grown into skilled and cheap workforce at BTC. KL folks can then be laid off, as they did to folks in some places recently. KL (and the other GBCS) are really meant to be the "buffer" workforce until India is established.
one friend from Bangkok told me this - GBC folks know they are all stuck in a transitory state. if their wages get higher (thus improving their standard of living), these big MNCs quickly decide it's not worth it to grow in that country, and thus move to cheaper places. if their wages remain stagnant... well it's sadder... yes you might still have a job for 20 years but who wants to always be paid one-tenth of American wages? and Indians do cost only about 10-15% of americans
I'd tell management to stop talking about long term careers... stop pushing technical careers, bright future, great opportunities... no one buys that bu-----t now, especially not the millennial. remember we hire smartest people? (I don't buy this bu-----t too... we're average just like everyone else. money has given us a thick shield to hide our averageness, esp our very average management. the pandemic has finally called out the emperor's new clothes)
we know it's all just about the bottom line. we're not family, because family doesnt PIP people. as we've seen this past 15 months, XOM doesn't take care of its folks. we'd better learn to think and plan and take care of ourselves... KLTC, BTC, the other GBCs, and of course the rest of us.