Technology

ONGC today is one of the most established and well renowned companies in the field
of oil exploration and production in India. The core activities which are involved in oil
exploration and production are to develop, operate fields to extract crude oils and
natural gas and to continue exploring and searching for new oil reserves. Hence the
process needs advanced technologies and highly skilled labor to be accomplished
successfully. Also the technical complexity of the work to be done is high and the
inputs needed for the exploration and development of oil reserves need to be good.
Strategy and Technology:
In the late 1990s, ONGC felt that the reason for their declining sales was their
obsolete technologies and hence to overcome this problem they adopted the
following two strategies.
The first strategy adopted was of acquiring MRPL for their advanced technology which
helped them to attain Euro II standards. The vertical integration strategy adopted by
ONGC which included acquiring MRPL gave them th1e advantage of the advanced
technologies adopted at MRPL.
The second strategy was adopted in 2000s by which they employed Increased Oil
Recovery (IOR),Enhanced Oil Recovery(EOR),SCADA.They also adopted virtual reality
interpretation centers and ERP system which covered all aspects of MIS,and the best
possible

systems

available

for

data

exploration,compilation,monitoring

and

processing

Continuing this strategy Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) of India has a fiveyear contract with Baker Hughes to provide drilling and evaluation services and to
manage third-party services for the Platinum Explorer drillship.Under the terms of the
contract, Baker Hughes will supply directional drilling, measurement-while-drilling,
logging-while-drilling, surface logging services, drilling fluids, liner hangers,
cementing and coring services. Baker Hughes also will manage third-party services
for air and sea logistics, the onshore base, and wellheads. Vantage Drillings Platinum

Explorer drillship is capable of drilling high-pressure, high- temperature (HP/HT) wells

in water depths up to 10,000 feet
Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) also has signed an agreement with Super Wave
Technology for doing research on alternative technology for hydraulic fracturing.
Hydraulic fracturing requires very large quantity of fresh water and huge quantity of
energy for pumping the same at very high pressures. Post hydraulic fracturing, the
well produces substantial quantity of effluent water which has to be disposed of.These
are issues regarding safe disposal of the water.Super Wave Technology (SWTPL) is a
company incorporated by Society for Innovation and Development, Indian Institute of
Science, Bangalore.
It also has signed an agreement with seven IITs for developing indigenous
technologies to enhance exploration and production of hydrocarbons and alternate
energy sources.
The industry-academia collaboration is aimed at bolstering 'Make in India' campaign
in energy sector, ONGC signed the Memorandum of Collaboration (MoC) with Pan-IIT,
a consortium of seven premier Indian Indian Institutes of Technology - IIT-Kharagpur,
IIT-Kanpur, IIT-Madras, IIT-Mumbai, IIT-Delhi, IIT-Guwahati and IIT-Roorkee.The MoC
also ideates promoting internships, visiting and adjunct faculty programs, research
oriented career programmes through an ONGC Scholar Programme.With this
collaboration, while ONGC will use intellectual expertise of the IITs, the actual work
will be done at the ONGC's in-house R&D Institutes and oilfields to enable the best
talents of the country to supplement each other by applying their mind on cuttingedge technologies to boost oil & gas production in the country.