SLB announces new digital collaborations

As the oil and gas sector accelerates the deployment of AI and digital technologies to optimise operations, SLB has reported two collaborations as its digital business goes from strength to strength

SLB, which reported 18% revenue growth year on year for its digital division in its second quarter results, has announced that Chevron Technical Center, a division of Chevron, has joined the digital subsurface collaboration established by SLB and TotalEnergies in 2024, boosting capacity for the co-development of next generation digital technologies for reservoir engineering and geoscience.

As operators manage increasingly complex reservoirs and growing volumes of subsurface data, the collaboration, known as Arena, will focus on technologies that help improve decision-making across reservoir engineering and geoscience workflows. By embedding TotalEnergies and Chevron subject matter experts within SLB technology centres, the collaboration will shorten traditional feedback loops between operators and product development teams, bringing operational perspectives directly into technology development. This model progresses the delivery of scalable, open and extensible digital technologies.

Chevron will contribute investment, intellectual property and technical expertise to the collaboration, as well as its expertise in uncertainty analysis, optimisation and field development planning, that will help shape the roadmap for scalable digital subsurface technologies.

“This collaboration brings SLB’s digital and subsurface expertise together with operator knowledge to help develop technologies for reservoir engineering and geoscience,” said Rakesh Jaggi, president of SLB’s digital business. “Chevron adds valuable experience and perspectives that will help strengthen how we address complex subsurface workflows and field development decisions.”

“Chevron is working to advance digital capabilities to unlock greater value from our subsurface resources,” said Jitendra Kikani, Chevron vice president of Subsurface. “Through Arena, we are combining our world-class expertise in uncertainty analysis with digital technologies and AI-enabled workflows to improve decision quality, accelerate insights, and enhance operational efficiency.”

Optimising well construction

Meanwhile a 15-year agreement with TotalEnergies to use the DrillPlan well planning and engineering solutions will strengthen the digital collaboration between the two companies, supporting TotalEnergies’ transition to a digital planning environment. The collaboration will enabled subsurface insights to be connected with well planning and engineering workflows as operators move toward scalable, interoperable digital platforms to improve engineering and well construction execution.

The DrillPlan solutions will enable TotalEnergies to streamline well design and engineering activities by integrating offset well data, trajectory designs, casing and completion inputs, and planning assumptions used throughout the well construction process.

“Operators are increasingly looking for scalable technologies that can support more consistent planning decisions across large and diverse portfolios,” said Rakesh Jaggi, president of SLB’s Digital business.

“This agreement demonstrates how customers are moving toward digital solutions that improve consistency, strengthen collaboration and provide a foundation for future workflow innovation.”
Drawing on domain expertise from both companies, the environment is designed to connect workflows, integrate custom processes, scale across operations, and enable ongoing deployment of new digital technologies.