GeoQuest IP web site gets award; helps UK attract new industry investment

Petroleum News Alaska Staff

One year after going live and sparking the development of IndigoPool.com, Schlumberger operating division GeoQuest was named the winner of the Information Technology Award — Best Application of New IT by the Institute of Petroleum.

The UK LIFT (license information for trading) oil and gas property online trading site, http://www.uklift.co.uk, was chosen from among a large international field of entries. Judging criteria included the project’s degree of innovation, commercial availability, scope of industry application and future development prospects.

The site was developed by Schlumberger GeoQuest, in collaboration with both the UK Department of Trade and Industry and UK Offshore Operators Association, to streamline the oil and gas acquisition and divestment process and promote United Kingdom continental shelf trading opportunities. UK LIFT has successfully attracted new investment and stimulated trading activity in the UK continental shelf by enabling license holders to publish license information for sale, trade and farm-out to a wider audience, at less cost and in a shorter time frame.

The site went live on Nov.1, 1999. Since then more than 1,600 users have registered to access details of 203 assets posted onto the site during the past year.

Based on the immediate acceptance of UK LIFT by the industry, the IndigoPool.com global Net marketplace http://www.indigopool.com was developed and launched by Schlumberger on Jan. 31, 2000.

The IndigoPool.com Net marketplace was developed to provide international oil companies, data vendors, and service providers with data, information, software tools, services and workspace to conduct business online in a secure, neutral environment.

Named by Forbes.com magazine as one of the leading B2B Web sites for the energy industry in its first year of operations, IndigoPool.com now has more than $3 billion in asset listings on five continents.