The Technology Foundations of Being Data Driven

Why technology foundations?

In recent years the energy industry has embraced a steep learning curve surrounding digital adoption and changing technology landscapes. With a rapid pace of change in technologies and growing challenges in finding the right people to implement technologies, the industry continues to face concerns in an already complex and diverse landscape. Additionally, without smooth operations in their technology platform and infrastructure, organisations are increasingly finding access to data and applications becoming problematic.

Without the right talent and experience to design, implement and support the technology platforms which are now required, organisations will face barriers in accessing and trusting data. With these barriers, organisations will encounter difficulties when building and supporting applications that sit on data. Additionally, these applications rely on critical technology operations to be continuously running smoothly.

When we delve into technology, there are a myriad of pressures facing organisations including business continuity, skills shortage, changing technology landscape and cloud adoption. From an infrastructure and platform perspective the adoption of the cloud is an area the industry has been slower to embrace. The adoption of cloud technology presents new possibilities for the industry to work smarter, particularly in terms of mobility, real-time, and predictive analytics.

If not addressed, problems can manifest themselves when accessing regulatory documentation. If a server is out of date and siloed data is inaccessible, it will present challenges in accessing the data you need when it’s required. In addition, our information frequently resides in disparate, on-premise, aging systems that are unable to connect without intervention. This hinders organisations on their journey to be data driven.

When organisations are thinking about technology investment, there is an increase in the need to concentrate on readily available solutions to integrate critical workflows across the business. The infrastructure which data and apps relies on often needs to be prioritised to ensure business can run as usual and support future projects.

How to build critical technology operations?

Sword works with the energy industry, delivering vital IT operations to allow customers to focus on their core business needs and objectives. With our deep understanding of the industry’s objectives and operational needs, we work to provide customers with a fit-for-purpose technology landscape, using the right infrastructure and solutions at the right time.

Organisations must focus on how they remain on top of their technology adoption. We work with customers to provide roadmaps that are aligned to their specific needs. These roadmaps provide a clear understanding of where your organisation needs to be in 3-5 years, how they need to be accessing data, and what foundations need to be put in place to access the data.

Our expertise in running critical infrastructure, deploying automated workflows, and managing information assets converges to put the right data, in the right hands, at the right time.

At Sword, we recognise the need for reliable infrastructure in an industry that undertakes multiple asset transitions. Our team have deep knowledge of oil and gas IT platforms, engineering content and subsurface data, and can be trusted partners throughout the process. With outdated data management platforms, the vast amounts of data being generated and stored across these systems makes it difficult for the end users to access and trust the lineage of data. Without trusted data, asset transition projects run the risk of falling behind and facing unforeseen expenses.

Our destination, data driven outcomes

Our industry can keep up to date with the rapid pace and change in technology. We have proven this over many decades, continually innovating in one of the harshest climates to operate.

Organisations should be looking at their overall objectives and aligning these with their critical IT technology. Maximising uptime, whilst minimising downtime, is just as important in IT infrastructure as it is on an offshore platform. Having secure and reliable infrastructure is critical when you want to deliver high-quality applications, built from trusted data.

If we, as an industry, are to achieve data-driven outcomes, we need to ensure that data is placed at the heart of our operational and project thinking. The only way we can do this is by ensuring the foundations our data is built on is a reliable and secure environment. With investment in solid, fit-for-purpose, platforms that integrate across office functions and operations, our customers can trust their data as a single source of truth.

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