This marriage of convenience is not always an easy one, however. 'Oil and gas people are more specialised than in many other industries,' says Takreem el-Tohamy, general manager, IBM Middle East & Pakistan. 'They have their own unique requirements with their own applications. Their main issue is performance and how to perform one step better, because oil is a very expensive game with so many specific elements.'

Understanding that mindset is not an easy task. Having only seriously started to look at the hydrocarbons sector in 2002, IBM is hoping that several years of intensive research and planning will place it in good stead with the major international and national oil and gas companies. It anticipates that the IT side of the hydrocarbons sector could be worth as much as $5,000 million to its business.

IBM's entrance into the energy sector has been gradual. The first step was in 2002 with the inauguration of the first Energy Competence Centre (ECC) in Abu Dhabi. The centre, set up in partnership with its sister company Intel, was created as a hardware establishment to showcase the company's latest computing hardware. The main purpose of the equipment was to see how vital data collected from hydrocarbons companies would fit with the latest IBM servers and Intel processors.

'Oil companies such as Schlumberger and Landmark were able to use the centre to test new versions of their own applications or try to apply their applications to an Intel platform,' says El-Tohamy. 'We also made the centre available to customers, because in the oil and gas industry applications are very special, very heavy and require lots of modifications. As a result, when customers want to buy something new or acquire new functionality, they need to reconsider their harbour platform and see whether it works with the new technology.'

Along with the centre in Abu Dhabi, the company is already planning to set up a second facility in Moscow this year and is eyeing the possibility of opening a third testing centre by year-end. However, it is in areas beyond platform technology that the US-based IT giant believes it can now make its mark.

High-performance computing clusters can analyse terabytes of seismic processing and reservoir simulation data. Whereas engineers used to make educated guesses about where to explore, and drilling teams put the theory to the test, sophisticated 3D visualisation systems are now used to refine the search first. Wireless handheld computers and laptops enable access to important data and applications direct from exploration and drilling sites. Companies are finding extracts and deposits more quickly and efficiently while controlling costs and reducing risks.

Sector-specific

Enter the likes of IBM. In February, it launched several solutions aimed at easing problems within the industry, but also consolidating various strands of a company's business. While the new solutions can be associated with the day-to-day running of other businesses crossing industries, IBM has now adapted various products for the hydrocarbons sector.

'IT in oil and gas was a niche sector,' says El-Tohamy. 'There were companies specifically doing it and the customer never really had a choice, but now with super computing we have that and the end-user applications are moving from specific platforms to other platforms. This is the shift that is happening.'

Deep computing visualisa