[Editor's note: A version of this story appears in the June 2020 edition of E&P. Subscribe to the magazine here.]  

PEOPLE

Joe B. Foster, founder and former chairman, president and CEO of Newfield Exploration Co., has passed away. According to an internal email sent to employ­ees by Ovintiv Inc., Foster, 86, died May 9 at his home in Hous­ton from an apparent heart attack. His death was not COVID-19- related. When he started Newfield in 1989, Foster had a team of 26 employees and $9 million of equi­ty capital. By the time he retired from Newfield in 2000, he had built the company into a thriving multibillion-dollar business.

Eni’s board of directors has appointed Claudio Descalzi CEO and general manager.

Mitch Little has retired as executive vice president of operations with Mar­athon Oil Corp. and will transition to executive vice president and adviser to the CEO with oversight for Equatorial Guinea operations. Additionally, Mike Henderson has been promoted to senior vice president of operations and will oversee Marathon Oil’s U.S. Resource Play businesses.

Stephen M. Johnson, CEO of WaterBridge Resources LLC, will transi­tion into the newly created role of vice chairman. He will be succeeded by CFO Steven Jones and COO Jason Long, who have been named co-CEOs. Both Jones and Long will retain their roles as CFO and COO, respectively.

ARROW Exploration Corp. has appointed Joe McFarlane CFO, succeeding John Newman.

Golar LNG Partners L.P. has appointed Karl Fredrik Staubo interim CEO and Golar LNG Ltd. has appointed Callum Mitch­ell-Thomson CFO, both succeeding Graham Robjohns, who has stepped down from those positions.

ConocoPhillips has announced the retirement of Don E. Wallette, Jr. as executive vice president and CFO, effective Aug. 31. He held a 39-year career with the company.

Nigel Filer has joined tech startup Xergy as an investor and COO.

Imperial Oil Ltd. has named S.P. (Simon) Younger senior vice presi­dent of upstream, effective June 1. He will succeed J.R. (John) Whelan, who has been appointed vice presi­dent of Global Heavy Oil at Exxon Mobil Upstream Oil and Gas.

SeekOps has named Jim Rutherford vice president of engineering.

The Oil and Gas Authority has appointed Iain Lanaghan and Sarah Deasley nonexecutive direc­tors. Deasley will assume responsibilities in October, following the retirement of Robert Armour at the end of September.

Xodus Group has appointed Nigel Under­wood to manage the com­pany’s London subsea and pipelines division.

Ian Tyler, Cairn Energy’s chairman, has announced his intention to retire from the board once a succes­sor has been appointed. The board will begin a comprehensive process to identify and appoint a successor, which is anticipated to take place within the next 12 months. In the meantime, Tyler has indicated his commitment to continue serving as chairman of the board.

Daniel Energy Partners has appointed 10 executive advisers: Don Gawick, Joe Freeman, Mark Hood, Larry Kerr, Chris Menefee, Royce Mitchell, Brian Smith, Garrett Smith, Bill Stanger and Denzil West.

Cub Energy Inc., a Ukraine-focused energy company, has appointed Patrick McGrath to the board. Dr. Timothy Marchant has resigned from the board.

 

COMPANIES

CUI Global Inc. has changed its name to Orbital Energy Group, Inc. The new name reflects the company’s strategic repositioning to become a diversified energy infra­structure services company.

Murphy Oil Corp. is set to relocate its headquarters to Houston, shutter­ing its legacy headquarters office in El Dorado, Ark., where the compa­ny was formed by its namesake in 1944. The E&P company also plans to close its longstanding office in Calgary, Alberta. Both offices are set to close by early third quarter.

Peloton has acquired ExproSoft, a supplier of well integrity, reliability and data modeling software and consulting services.

MAKEEN Energy’s daughter company, Kosan Crisplant, has signed an agreement to acquire Gas Equipment Company Inc.

The Petroleum Equipment & Services Association welcomed Wellbore Integrity Solutions as its new member company.

The Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission, a consortium of 31 states, has asked the Trump administration for stimulus funds to hire laid-off energy workers to plug abandoned wells, a pro­posal aimed at fending off unemploy­ment while tackling a growing environ­mental problem.

Emerson will invest more than $100 million in Boulder to significantly expand its manufacturing space and launch a new innovation center focused on research, new product development and industry training for its advanced flow measurement products. The nearly 180,000-sq-ft expansion includes a new, 85,000-sq-ft laboratory and manufacturing facility to design and develop products, technologies and software that mea­sure and control the flow of material in a manufacturing process.

KLX Energy Services Holdings Inc. and Quintana Energy Services Inc. announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement whereby the companies will combine in an all-stock merger transaction. The merger is expected to close in the second half of 2020.

Flotek Industries Inc. has acquired 100% ownership of JP3 Measurement LLC, a privately held data and analytics technology company, in a cash-and-stock transaction. The transaction is valued at approximately $34.4 million.

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