It starts with the birth of the Arabian oil. Saudi ARAMCO traces its beginnings to 1933 when a Concession Agreement was signed between Saudi Arabia and the Standard Oil Company of California (SOCAL). With this, a subsidiary company known as California Arabian Standard Oil Company (CASOC) was formed by management’s agreement. The drilling for oil started in 1935 in the Saudi desert and till 1938, there was no success. In that year only, they hit oil and called that place DAMMAM No.7 which means “Prosperity Well.”
From the 1940s, the company created record-breaking milestones in oil production. They were producing nearly 500,000 barrels of crude oil per day till 1949. This was the time when they named the company ARAMCO (Arabia American Oil Company). In 1950, they completed 1,212 kilometers Trans-Arabian Pipeline, the longest in the world at that time. This pipeline connected Eastern Saudi with the Mediterranean Sea cutting time and cost. In the year 1951, they hit the jackpot which was named as Safaniyah field, which turned out to be the world’s longest offshore oil field. By 1962, the company had completed with cumulative production of 5 billion barrels of crude oil. Till 1970, the company was the economic force of Saudi Arabia.
In the year 1973, the Saudi government bought 25 percent Interest in the company which became 100 percent till 1980. After eight years, Saudi ARAMCO (Saudi Arabian Oil Company) was officially established under the then Saudi Prince. Al-Naimi became the President of ARAMCO in 1984 and the CEO as well in 1988. He later became the Saudi Arabian Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources. By 1989, ARAMCO had transformed from an oil producing and exporting company to a petroleum enterprise.
ARAMCO President and CEO, Al-Naimi
Till the 1990s, the company extended its arms in countries like Korea and Philippines where it bought 35 percent interest in the Ssang Yong Oil Refining company and 40 percent interest in Petron Corporation (the largest refiner and marketer of Philippines) respectively.
In 1997, the company started innovating in technology and developed POWERS (Parallel-oil-water-gas reservoir simulator). With these advancements, the company built a state-of-the-art Research and Development Centre in Dhahran for its scientists.
Their success was noticed by the World in the year 2002 when they unveiled:
GigaPOWERS, the second generation of POWERS and
TeraPOWER, the industry’s first trillion cell reservoir simulator
With this, the company has been serving the world’s need for oil and gas. Also, they have been trying to move beyond traditional methods for energy and are working to find solutions for cleaner and efficient energy sources.
All the above content lets you know about the company briefly. Now the question is, where does the company stand today?
For this, I will be sharing some facts with you which are as follows;
The company pays $102 billion in taxes to the Saudi government which is way more than Apple and Alphabet’s combined profit which makes it the world’s most profitable company as of today.
Saudi ARAMCO made a profit worth $111 billion in 2018. For the reader’s frame of reference, Apple and Alphabet made profit amounting to $59.93billion and $8.9 billion respectively.
In 2018, ARAMCO’s cash flow from operations was $121 billion and capital expenditure of $35.1 billion. Apple and Alphabet are nowhere near this figure.
The Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has valued the company at $2 trillion which is more than double the value of Apple today.
The only reason for some of us being unaware of such an Iron Monger giant is because the company is still not listed. Saudi Arabia has canceled the public listing of the State’s giant, in what could have been the largest IPO in history.
Well, now you know that a company as such exist…
Comments