Shell plc: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 06:45, 30 July 2025

Revision as of 03:56, 2 August 2025

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[[File:Shell Pernis refinery 2019.jpg|thumb|Europe's largest refinery, Shell Pernis, in [[Rotterdam]], 2019]]

[[File:Shell filling station, Greece.jpg|thumb|Filling station in [[Argos, Peloponnese]] owned by Shell. Shell and local subsidiaries own and operate thousands of filling stations worldwide.]]

Shell's primary business is the management of a [[Vertical integration|vertically integrated]] oil company. The development of technical and commercial expertise in all stages of this vertical integration, from the initial search for oil (exploration) through its harvesting (production), transportation, [[Oil refinery|refining]] and finally trading and marketing established the core competencies on which the company was founded. Similar competencies were required for natural gas, which has become one of the most important businesses in which Shell is involved, and which contributes a significant proportion of the company's profits. While the vertically integrated business model provided significant [[economies of scale]] and [[barriers to entry]], each business now seeks to be a self-supporting unit without subsidies from other parts of the company.<ref>{{cite news|url=httphttps://www.economist.com/nodenews/133960612009/03/30/vertical-integration|title=Vertical integration|newspaper=The Economist|date=30 March 2009|access-date=11 April 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170520062103/http://www.economist.com/node/13396061|archive-date=20 May 2017|url-status=live}}</ref>

Traditionally, Shell was a heavily decentralised business worldwide (especially in the downstream) with companies in over 100 countries, each of which operated with a high degree of independence. The upstream tended to be far more centralised with much of the technical and financial direction coming from the central offices in [[The Hague]]. The upstream oil sector is also commonly known as the "exploration and production" sector.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.psac.ca/business/industry-overview/|title=Industry Overview|publisher=Petroleum Services Association of Canada|access-date=11 April 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170508053546/http://www.psac.ca/business/industry-overview/|archive-date=8 May 2017|url-status=live}}</ref>