The traditional oilfield services business is broken and the only way to fix it is a complete rethink on how the industry does business. At least that’s what the Paal Kibsgaard, the CEO of industry leader Schlumberger is telling the world . Oilfield services has been a strong business for about a decade now, but in the last year it has become absolutely abysmal. North American onshore rig counts have collapsed, offshore services have been in the tank for a couple of years, every oil major out there has renegotiated every part of their service contract to slash their own costs (and correspondingly OFS profits), and the pressure shows no sign of abating. The situation is bad enough that it has led Halliburton and Baker Hughes to try consummating a very difficult merger that is getting significant pushback from many quarters . Against that backdrop, it’s little wonder that […]

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