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Posts from ‘May, 2009’
Shell rumored to plan restructuring, layoffs
POSTED: 05/27/2009 01:00:00 AM MDT
LONDON — Royal Dutch Shell will announce a major company restructuring, merging its exploration and production and gas and power units and laying off more than 30 percent of senior management, according to a post on the blog of Shell critic John Donovan Tuesday.
Shell’s incoming chief executive Peter Voser will announce the measures Thursday at a meeting of around 100 top company executives in Berlin, Donovan wrote on the blog royaldutchshellplc.com, citing multiple unnamed people working for Shell.
The merged units will be run on a centrally organized basis and some regional offices will be closed, he said.
A Shell spokesman declined to comment on the report.
A person familiar with Shell’s thinking told Dow Jones Newswires that Voser put this restructuring plan to the Shell board, with the aim of making significant costs cuts, some months ago when he was competing to replace current chief executive Jeroen van der Veer, who retires at the end of June.
“This has been bubbling away for quite some time,” and Voser’s rise to the position of chief executive has brought it to a head, the person said. The resignation Tuesday of Shell’s gas and power chief, Linda Cook, who was also a candidate for the top job, is probably related to Voser’s plan and their sometimes difficult working relationship, the person said.
Cost cutting to top agenda of incoming Shell chief
By Ed Crooks
Published: May 27 2009 03:00 | Last updated: May 27 2009 03:00
Peter Voser, who takes over as chief executive at Royal Dutch Shell on July 1, is not wasting any time in reshaping the company the way he wants it.
After having spent five years as chief financial officer , it would be surprising if he did not have some reasonably well-formed ideas about what he wants to do.
The departure of Linda Cook as head of gas and power presages a more fundamental shake-up at Shell.
Those changes can be expected to include a systematic attack on the company’s costs.
Rumours have been going round the company for months that Shell’s three divisions – exploration and production; gas and power; and downstream, including refining, marketing and chemicals – could be folded into two.
Ms Cook’s departure has ignited speculation that such a move could be imminent.
Royaldutchshellplc.com, a website used to air stories and complaints about Shell, reported yesterday that E&P and gas and power would be combined into a single division.
Ms Cook has spoken in the past about the importance of having the separate division to focus on activities such as liquefied natural gas, which provides a large and growing proportion of Shell’s business. She may have been unwilling to see it merged into a larger unit.
Last year’s decision to downgrade the job of the head of downstream and remove the board-level position that came with it also hinted at such a shake-up.
An integration of E&P with gas and power would mirror the reorganisation introduced at rival BP by Tony Hayward, the chief executive who took over two years ago, which also merged three business segments into two.
BP has made a more high-profile attempt to attack costs than Shell, saying it planned more than 5,000 job cuts.
Jeroen van der Veer, Shell’s chief executive, who steps down at the end of June, told the Financial Times last month he expected the company’s head count – 102,000 at the end of last year – to fall over the course of the year.
However, he refused to set a total figure for planned job losses, saying such targets could create a focus for staff discontent. Under Mr Voser, that softly-softly approach is likely to harden.
Although the rise in the price of oil from less than $33 per barrel to about $60 today has relieved some of the darkest fears about the outlook for the oil industry, companies are still suffering from very high costs built up during the good times.
Even at $60 per barrel, a cost structure based on $100 oil causes problems, and the volatility of commodity prices suggests there is a real risk that crude will fall back again.
Shell has particular issues because of its enthusiasm for high-cost “unconventional” production.
Among its large projects coming on stream around the turn of the decade, which will drive production growth over the next few years, are developments in Canada’s oil sands, LNG, and converting gas to liquid fuels.
All of those are high-cost operations requiring huge investment, which is expected to reach up to $32bn this year.
Sustaining that investment while cash flows are squeezed means Shell’s debts are rising fast.
Gearing, defined by the company as net debt as a proportion of capital employed, is set to rise from 7 per cent at the end of 2008 to the “low 20s” by the end of this year.
That kind of increase is bearable for a huge, financially sound company such as Shell, but Mr Voser will not want debt to keep rising at that rate for much longer.
A renewed squeeze on costs carries risks: Shell, like other oil companies, may fail to develop the capacity it needs for future growth.
But the severity of the global downturn means it is probably inescapable.
www.ft.com/energy
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009
The most informative online source of Royal Dutch Shell news
By John Donovan
This was all the information published by Shell on its official website yesterday concerning the departure of Linda Cook.
26/05/2009 Royal Dutch Shell plc announces directorate change
The Board of Royal Dutch Shell plc announced today that Mrs Linda Cook will resign as Executive Director of the Company on 1st June 2009. She has served the Company for 29 years of which the last 5 years as Executive Director of Gas & Power, Shell Trading, Global Solutions and Technology.
Compare that with the wealth of information and comment published here the same day in the form of articles and Shell Blog postings. We are especially grateful for all the Shell insider contributions which make this site far and away the best online source of honest information and debate about Royal Dutch Shell i.e. free of Shell spin and influence.
We apologise if you found it difficult at times yesterday to visit. The site was overwhelmed by traffic as a result of us being the first to break the news about the departure of Linda Cook and the confidential revolutionary plans Peter Voser is announcing in Berlin.
Linda Cook, Shell’s top woman executive, resigns
Linda Cook, the head of Shell’s gas business, resigned abruptly yesterday, the first boardroom casualty at the hands of Peter Voser, the new chief executive of the oil company.
Click to continue reading “Linda Cook, Shell’s top woman executive, resigns”
Shell shock as long-timer Cook is first to go in Voser cull
Daily Mail
By SAM FLEMING
Last updated at 11:53 PM on 26th May 2009
Going: Linda Cook will leave Shell after nearly 30 years working for the firm
A management shakeup is looming at oil giant Royal Dutch Shell as anointed chief executive Peter Voser prepares to take the helm.
Shell yesterday announced the sudden departure of gas & power chief Linda Cook, who has been at the company for almost three decades. Cook will step down from the board next week and then leave her post at end of June.
The surprise decision is thought to be a prelude to wide-ranging changes at the top, as Swiss-born Voser succeeds Jeroen van der Veer as chief executive.
It comes amid a tumultuous month for Shell, which was last week rocked by the biggest City pay revolt on record.
Cook’s departure comes on the eve of a two-day meeting of the Anglo-Dutch giant’s leading officers in Berlin.
Voser is expected to use the summit to announce the culling of almost a third of Shell’s senior managers, according to a report on company gossip site Royaldutchshellplc.com yesterday.
The unauthorised site, which has regularly obtained leaks from Shell insiders, said Voser will also announce the merger of Shell’s Gas & Power and Exploration & Production divisions at the meeting, which may help explain Cook’s departure.
The firm refused to reveal the terms under which Cook is going, but by departing before 2011 she will have to forgo a ‘golden handcuffs’ present worth over £800,000. She is paid a basic salary of £825,413 year.
The company said American-born Cook, the most senior woman in Shell’s ranks, is leaving ‘by mutual agreement after 29 years service to the company’.
Any replacement is ‘the subject of a future decision,’ Shell said. The shares added 16p to 1,647p.
‘Peter is shaping his new team, and as you would expect for a CEO-designate, he has a say in senior management development,’ said a spokesman. ‘Her next plans are really a personal matter for her.’
Cook had been a possible rival to Voser for the position of chief executive. Fadel Gheit, an oil analyst at Oppenheimer in New York, said he did not want to see too wide-ranging a shakeout at the top of Shell.
‘The priority with this company is to ensure continuity,’ said Gheit. ‘You don’t want to shuffle the deck too much – you want to make an orderly transition.’
The position of Sir Peter Job, head of Shell’s remuneration committee, is also under question after the unprecedented pay revolt.
Shell is also this week being forced to revisit the dark circumstances surrounding the 1995 execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa, as relatives of the Nigerian environmental activist begin a U.S. court case. Shell has denied collaborating with Nigerian authorities in the execution of Saro-Wiwa and eight others.
U.S. Cracks Down on Corporate Bribes
Among the companies currently under Justice Department review: Sun Microsystems Inc. and Royal Dutch Shell PLC…
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Shell’s N.Y. trial over Nigerian deaths delayed
NEW YORK, May 26 (Reuters) – A civil trial over the alleged involvement of giant oil producer Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSa.L) in the executions of protesters in Nigeria in the 1990s has been delayed until next week, a court clerk said on Tuesday.
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Shell faces legal fight over alleged human rights abuse and pollution
Jeroen van der Veer’s tenure as chief executive ends amid outcry over bonuses, environmental record and human rights abuses
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Shell showing three into two will go
It is expected that exploration and production and gas and power will be combined into a single division. The merged business is then expected to be split in two, with an American division run by Marvin Odum, now head of Shell Oil, the US subsidiary, and the rest of the world run by Malcolm Brinded, now head of exploration and production.
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