The Hindu Business Line : IBS makes a sales pitch to lure Indian oil cos to iLogistics

iLogistics integrates the planning and execution of all logistics operations and supports air, marine and land-based modes transportation of personnel and material.

Mumbai , Nov. 28

THIS company claimed to be one with a difference. A Thiruvananthapuram-based domain specialist for the travel, transportation and logistics industry, IBS Software Services, with Rs 82-crore turnover last fiscal, was faced with the prospect of backing up this claim.

When a senior IBS team had an interactive meeting here during the weekend with some of the leading players in Indian exploration and production (E&P) business, it had a sales pitch to make.

IBS had to try and convince its potential Indian customers — mainly ONGC, Reliance, Essar — that iLogistics, the product it was trying to push, was a sure bet in managing logistics operations for oil and gas exploration and production.

However, for IBS Software, the Indian E&P sector is still at a nebulous stage, given that the Kerala-based company had just signed up with Shell International Exploration and Production BV to implement iLogistics in 32 of its locations worldwide.

The rollout of the product at Shell's Sakhalin fields that began in July this year was completed last month. Next on the cards is a Shell field in New Zealand, followed by those in Malaysia, Nigeria, Libya and Egypt.

Mr V. K. Mathews, Chairman and Managing Director, IBS, said, "It will take us about three years to cover all the Shell locations once. The deal is for a minimum period of 10 years. We cannot divulge the details on the revenues we will earn from this deal but we will be reducing to 10 per cent the logistics cost of Shell, which at present is 20 per cent of their exploration costs. The deal took about 18 months to negotiate."

iLogistics integrates the planning and execution of all logistics operations and supports air, marine and land-based modes transportation of personnel and material. It also enables the sharing of logistics resources such as helicopters and supply vessels within a company and among other industry partners, translating into significant cost savings.

Currently, BP, Unocal and Apache are three oil companies that are using iLogistics and with Shell also joining the list.

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