Shell oil royal dutch shell. Creation of the Shell brand. The story is a legend of the Shell brand. Shell logo. Shell in Russia

The history of Shell began in 1833, when an English merchant, Marcus Samuel, opened a small shop in London selling various trinkets decorated with seashells (shell in English means shell) and other exotic oriental products. Shell was the name of Samuel's father's shop in London. The venture turned out to be profitable, and Samuel organized the delivery of seafood from the Far East using his small coastal fleet. The ships en route from the metropolis to the colony carried various cargoes on board, including oil products. Samuel, being a talented businessman, saw a great future in the oil business during the period of its practical birth. After his death, in 1870, the business passed to his sons, who in 1878 founded their own company.

The circle of activities of the Samuel brothers expanded rapidly, especially after Markus Samuel Jr. visited Batumi in 1890, from where Baku oil was exported. He decided to take on the transportation of oil around the world using tankers.

The world's first oil tanker was built in Russia at the Baku shipyards and was called "Zoroaster", in memory of the Zoroastrians - fire worshipers, the ancestors of modern Armenians. Samuel was shocked when he saw the Russian tanker.

Having turned out to be a very quick-witted businessman, already in 1892 he managed to build his first tanker called "Murex" with a displacement of 5 thousand tons at one of the British shipyards. In commemoration of this event, the lead tanker of Shell's oil fleet is now called Murex. Key point is that the design of the tanker invented by Marcus Samuel excluded the threat of spontaneous combustion of oil products. In addition, Murex was registered by the Lloyd agency and met the stringent requirements of sea transportation through the Suez Canal, (which previously could not have been achieved by any oil company), through which it was planned to transport oil and other oil products. The Murex made its first voyage in August 1892 with a cargo of 4 thousand tons of Russian kerosene on the Batumi-Singapore-Bangkok route.

That is why the first "branded" product supplied by Shell to Far Eastern consumers in early 1893 was Russian kerosene.

Oil transportation also gave rise to new problems - in the ports of the Far East, the enterprising Samuel built large oil storage tanks. And also factories for the production of packaging, which local residents used for a variety of purposes, including for the manufacture of roofs.

By the late 1990s, Samuel's oil business had grown so much that he founded a separate company in 1897 called Shell Transport and Trading Company Ltd. But the creation of a world-class oil corporation was still a long way off. Marcus Samuel still had a powerful enemy in the face of the American monopoly Standard Oil. The need to resist American expansion became the basis for the rapprochement between Shell and Royal Dutch, which Samuel once viewed as nothing less than a dangerous competitor. Royal Dutch Petroleum was established in 1890 under the auspices of the King of the Netherlands, who developed a rich deposit on the island of Sumatra and fiercely competed with Shell for markets. However, history was pleased to dispose of the fate of these two companies in its own way.

In 1902, after lengthy negotiations, Shell and Royal Dutch created the Asian Petroleum concern, whose goal was to expand the trade in oil and petroleum products, including Russian production, in the Far East region. In 1907, the capital and interests of Royal Dutch Petroleum and Shell Transport & Trading K. were finally united, which served as the foundation of the corporation known throughout the world today as Royal Dutch / Shell. In 1900, Henry Detering (1866-1939) became the managing director of this company, and then the chairman of the board of directors, who was later called "the oil Napoleon." Detering was a supporter of the Shell partnership. On his initiative in 1907, the capital of Royal Dutch and Shell was merged, new company with two head offices in London and The Hague.

In the combined concern, 60% of the shares were owned by Royal Dutch, and 40% by Shell. This ratio has been maintained to this day.

A period of growth soon began. The scope of the concern was constantly expanding, new deposits of crude oil were developed, scattered almost all over the world. Powerful oil refineries were controlled by the center in order to more prompt demand for oil products. The rights to oil production were acquired in Romania (1906), Russia (1910), Egypt (1913), Venezuela (1913) and some other countries and regions.

In 1912, the concern entered the US domestic market, starting the development of oil fields and the construction of oil pipelines. In connection with the development of sea and road transport, Shell relied on the production of fuel oil and gasoline and was not mistaken, which brought him enormous profits.

In 1919, British pilots John Alcock and Arthur Whitten-Brown made the first non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean on a Shell fueled plane.

The First World War somewhat slowed down the company's rapid ascent to the oil Olympus, but after its end, active growth again. Companies are established in the USA, the Middle East, Malaysia, East and South Africa. At the beginning of the 30s, Shell takes the first steps in the development of production chemical products based on oil. By the end of the 1930s, Shell was producing about 600,000 barrels of crude oil per day, which was more than 10% of world production.

The years of World War II were not easy for Shell. The Netherlands was occupied by Germany. Romania and Far East also remained beyond the company's reach.

Shell has actively worked with allied governments to ensure an uninterrupted supply of aviation and motor gasoline, as well as fuel oil to all military fronts.

The chemical company Shell Chemical Corporation has established the production of butadiene for the manufacture of synthetic rubber. During the war, all of the company's tankers came under the command of the government, as a result, in 1945, Shell was missing 87 of its ships.

After the end of the war, the concern set about restoring the destroyed enterprises and coped with this task quite quickly. The build-up of refining capacities began. The production of petroleum products has increased in almost all regions, especially in Venezuela.

Early 50s world economy felt the need for new sources of crude oil. The concern launched prospecting and exploration work in Algeria, Trinidad, offshore British Borneo. Fields were discovered in the Netherlands (Schunebeck), Canada, Colombia, Iraq. The increased volumes of oil production, naturally, entailed the construction of new oil refineries, the largest of which were built in the Dutch port of Pernis, the French city of Rouen, Cardone (Venezuela), Geelong (Australia), Bombay.

In the 1950s, Shell already accounted for one-seventh of the world's petroleum product production, the output of which has been steadily increasing. More powerful and capacious tankers (up to 200 thousand tons) were required to transport oil. Soon such tankers became the main unit of the Shell fleet.

In 1959, a joint venture between Shell and Exxon in the Dutch town of Gronningen discovered one of the richest deposits natural gas... Gas production has become another area of ​​the diversified Shell concern. By the early 1970s, Gronningen produced half of the gas consumed in Western Europe.

In the mid-1960s, Shell explored several unique gas fields in the North Sea at once, which required the development of new technology sea ​​transportation of liquefied gas. In the 1970s, Shell and its partners managed to deliver five million tons of liquefied gas from Brunei to Japan. Shell has pioneered large-scale gas liquefaction and long-distance shipping projects. In the 1980s, the export of liquefied natural gas produced by the concern grew significantly - in 1989, the largest project for the development of the north-western shelf of Australia and the supply of liquefied natural gas to Japan was carried out.

In addition to gas, in 1971 in the North Sea in an extremely difficult natural conditions the giant Brent oil field was explored. Exploration and development in the North Sea later became Shell's largest industry. Severe weather conditions dictated the need to use high-tech equipment for oil production. Following Brent, Shell discovered the Cormorant (1972), Dunlin (1973), Terne (1975) and Ayder (1976) deposits. Brent's development is considered one of the most technologically complex and costly projects in the history of mankind.

In the mid-1970s, oil demand dropped. The events in Iran 1978-79 and the related restrictions on oil supplies - all this gave rise to the need to search for alternative sources of energy. Gas consumption in Europe more than doubled in the late 1970s. Shell and its partners provided 50% of this amount.

Expanding the range of its activities, the concern strengthened its positions in the coal and metallurgical industries. In 1981, a large magnesium plant was commissioned in Wendam (Netherlands).

During the 1980s, Shell focused on product and service differentiation, increasing production efficiency through the automation of distribution and sales networks.

During the same period, Shell switched to the production of unleaded gasoline, a cleaner fuel.

By the end of the decade, the company was processing about three million barrels of crude oil at its refineries. A quarter of the group's total income came from chemical production. Still, the 1980s were unprecedented in the development of offshore fields in the North Sea. The Troll gas field, the second largest in Europe, was discovered in its Norwegian sector. The two largest oil and gas fields, Bulwinkle and Auger, were explored in the Gulf of Mexico. In 1989, the daily oil production from the Bulwinkle platform, installed at a depth of 412 m, reached 8 thousand barrels. In 1994, another gigantic platform, Auger, was built on pre-tensioned supports, the height of which was 872 m. It is the tallest permanent structure in the world on the seabed.

To save competitive advantage Shell is ready to make drastic changes in its structure. These changes include the July 2005 merger of parent companies Royal Dutch and Shell Transport into a single company- Royal Dutch Shell plc.

Shell logo

For more than a century, the word "shell" or "Shell", the scallop shell emblem and distinctive colors - red and yellow - have been used to identify the brand and promote the company's reputation. These symbols represent the quality of products and services, professionalism and values ​​around the world.

Why red and yellow?

In 1915, the California-based Shell company built service stations for the first time, and they needed to differentiate themselves from the competition. They used vibrant colors that would not be offensive to the residents of California: due to the state's close Spanish ties, red and yellow were chosen.

Today's colors emerged years later, with the introduction of Shell's vibrant, memorable reds and yellows in 1995 for the company's new retail products. The scallop remains one of the most famous brand symbols in the 21st century.


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SHELL LUBRICANTS Shell Transport and Trading Company Limited (England, 1897) - 40% Oil and kerosene trading HISTORY Royal Dutch Petroleum Company (Holland, 1890) - 60% Development of oil fields in the West Indies and Sumatra Royal Dutch / Shell, 1907 +


SHELL LUBRICANTS Shell structure Shareholders of Royal Dutch Petroleum Co. Netherlands 60% Shell Transport & Trading Co. UK 40% Shell Petroleum NV Netherlands Shell Petroleum Petroleum Co. Ltd UK Service companies Manufacturing companies Consulting services


SHELL LUBRICANTS BUSINESS STRUCTURE SHELL Royal Dutch / Shell Group Petroleum products Lubricants Lubricants Lubricants Petrol stations Oil transportation and trading Oil transportation and trading Oil refining Oil refining Bitumen / LPG / Fuels Bitumen / LPG / Fuels Oil and gas exploration and production Oil and gas exploration and production Natural gas and energy Natural gas and energy Petrochemicals Renewable energy sources Renewable energy sources


SHELL LUBRICANTS ROYAL SENSOR / SHELL CONCERN - OUR DAYS: about 96 thousand employees of almost 2000 operating companies in 135 countries of the world; annual turnover over $ 100 billion; about gas stations serving more than 20 million visitors daily; According to a survey of private car owners in 69 countries around the world, Shell is the most preferred brand in 40 countries and ranks 2nd in 20 countries worldwide (1998).


SHELL LUBRICANTS PURPOSE FOR THE FUTURE Development of new environmentally friendly and renewable energy sources: - participation in the project of turning Iceland into a country of hydrogen energy; - the first solar energy stations in South Africa, Germany and Holland; - wind stations in Germany, Holland, France and England - bioresources - forests in the south-east. Asia and Lat. America.




SHELL LUBRICANTS Shell Ownership Joint Venture Contract Perm Yokohama Kobe Durban Bombay Pusan ​​Fremantle Koashung Kuching Pandacan Hong Kong Rio de Janiero Buenos Aires Valpariso Antofagusta Callao Guayaquil Bogota Trinidad Asuncion Panama Metarie Guatemala Bogota Trinidad Asuncion Panama Metarie Guatemala Bogota Willowvale Tema Abidjan Lagos Guinea Casablanca Seawaren Wood River Shanghai Bangkok Singapore Port Dickson Tanjung Priok Brisbane Sydney Melbourne Sta. Dom ingo Kingston P. Rico Paramaribo Tunis Derince Perama Helsinki Copenhagen Honduras Komarom Canaries Stanlow Gent Pernis Hamburg Nanterre Birsfelden Aseol Lobau Milan Tarragona Wellington Christchurch Pakistan 5 plants Chittagong Port Sudan Cilacap SHELL: GEOGRAPHY AROUND 70 OIL PRODUCTS WORLDWIDE


SHELL LUBRICANTS GLOBAL LUBRICANTS MARKET Others 38.9% Shell 8.4% State-owned companies 31.5% Castrol 3.8% Tex / Cal / Chev 3.9% Esso 5.3% Mobil 6.3% BP 1.9% 1997 After 1998: Esso + Mobil, BP + Amoco + Castrol, Elf + Total + Fina, Chevron + Texaco, Pennzoil + Quaker State + Conoco, USA: Shell + Texaco + Saudi Refining Int. = Shell + Motiva, Shell + Pennzoil


SHELL LUBRICANTS Shell in Russia: history 1890s - Marcus Samuel visits Batum Shell acquires a number of Russian enterprises (Mazut, Russian-Black Sea Shipping Company) Shell loses as a result of nationalization of all its enterprises in Russia Shell continues to buy oil in the USSR Shell participates in the supply of oil products and food products in the USSR under lend-lease After Shell buys oil and oil products in the USSR and Russia Shell representative office in Russia is opened Shell Oil company is registered




SHELL LUBRICANTS Shell in Russia today: SAKHALIN-2 Project operator - Sakhalin Energy (Shell - 55%, Mitsui - 25%, Mitsubishi - 20%) Total investment level - US $ 10 billion Commercial oil production started in July 1999 Gas production started scheduled for 2006 Piltun-Astokhskoye (oil) and Lunskoye (gas) fields


SHELL LUBRICANTS Shell in Russia today: marketing of Shell East Europe Co. petroleum products. Ltd. / Shell Oil CJSC Operates in Russia and some CIS countries Provides 20% of the demand for imported lubricants Agreement with Lukoil on the mixing of industrial oils in Perm at the Permnefteorgsintez plant - Rimula, Gadinia, Melina, Agina, Alexia Shell Helix engine oils


SHELL LUBRICANTS Shell in Russia today: petrochemical products Shell Chemicals North East Europe LLC Main products: hydrocarbon and chemical solvents, components for the production of polyurethane foams, propylene glycols, fatty alcohols and their derivatives, alpha-olefins, catalysts Main consumers - refineries, as well as chemical enterprises , metallurgical, paint and varnish, cosmetic, pharmaceutical, mining, furniture, food and textile industries


SHELL LUBRICANTS Shell in Russia today: filling stations Shell filling stations LLC (St. Petersburg) The development of the network began in 1997 Today - 6 filling stations The network expansion is planned environmentally friendly oil change, improved underground reservoirs

Royal Dutch Shell(Shell) is a British-Dutch company, the third largest private oil and gas company in the world after I. Headquarters - in ().

Structure and leadership

Until mid-2005, the structure of the company had an original "dual" character: Royal Dutch Petroleum Company and The "Shell" Transport and Trading Company Ltd were the so-called "parent companies" (they did not production activities and were not part of the concern). The "Parent Companies" owned shares in the holding companies of the concern - the Dutch Shell Petroleum N.V. and the British Shell Petroleum Company Limited, with Royal Dutch Petroleum Company owning 60% and Shell Transport and Trading Company 40% of the holding companies. In turn, the holding companies owned all of the shares in the service companies and, directly or indirectly, the entire share of Shell in the manufacturing companies.

In the summer of 2005, the shareholders of Royal Dutch Petroleum Company and The "Shell" Transport and Trading Company Ltd approved the merger of the parent companies into one company headquartered in the Netherlands. This deal turned the Netherlands into the world's largest investor in 2005, and the UK into the main recipient of investments in the world (they tripled to $ 164.5 billion).

According to the company, its largest shareholders as of March 1, 2006 were Barclays (4.28% of class A shares and 4.13% of class B shares), Legal & General Group (3.08% and 3.94%), Capital Croup ( 7.5% and 4.45%) and UBS (3.16% class A shares). Market capitalization as of July 14, 2006 - about $ 235 billion.

The chairman of the board of directors of the company is Aad Jacobs. Chief Executive Officer - Jeroen van der Veer.

Activity

Shell conducts geological exploration and production of oil and gas in more than 40 countries around the world. Shell owns the world's largest network of over 55,000 stations. Shell also owns, in whole or in part, more than 50 oil refineries.

In addition, Shell owns a significant number of chemical enterprises, as well as industries and other alternative energy sources.

Oil and gas production in 2005 amounted to about 3.5 million barrels of oil equivalent per day (about 180 million tons of oil equivalent per year).

The total number of the company's personnel is about 110 thousand people. The company's revenue in 2005 amounted to $ 306.7 billion (in 2004 - $ 266.4 billion), net profit - $ 26.3 billion ($ 19.3 billion).

Royal Dutch Shell in Russia

Royal Dutch Shell is one of the largest foreign investors in Russia in terms of investment volume. In our country, Royal Dutch Shell is involved in the development of the shelf (a project jointly with Japanese Mitsui and) and the Salym group fields in. The company also plans to take part in the development of offshore oil and gas projects together with.

The company has a network (as of mid-July 2006 - 18 stations).

Royal Dutch Shell PLC(better known as Shell) is a British-Dutch vertically integrated oil and gas company, formed by the merger of the Dutch Royal Dutch Petroleum and British Shell Transport & Trading. The headquarters of the organization is located in the Netherlands, while the company is registered as a corporation in the UK.

Royal Dutch Shell's activities include the exploration, production, refining and marketing of oil, gas and petroleum products. The company operates in more than 90 countries and has more than 44,000 filling stations around the world. April 13, 2015 market capitalization Shell was valued at £ 129.8 billion. The company's shares are included in the calculation of the FTSE 100 index.

Royal Dutch Shell
© site
Date of foundation 1907 year
Headquarters location The Hague, Netherlands
Chairman lighting directors
Charles Holiday
General manager
Ben van Beurden
Head in Russia William Kozik
Turnover
$ 264.96 billion(2015)
Net profit
$ 1.939 billion(2015)
Number of employees
94,000 people

history of the company

Royal Dutch Shell was established in February 1907 year by merging two competing companies - the Dutch Royal Dutch Petroleum Company and the British "Shell" Transport and Trading Company Ltd. This step was largely due to the need to create serious competition Standard Oil... For a number of reasons, the companies worked as an association, but at the same time had separate legal entities... Under the terms of the merger, 60% of the property was transferred to a Dutch company, 40% to a British company.

Royal Dutch Petroleum Company- a company established in 1890 year in The Hague for the development of a field in Sumatra, in the Dutch East Indies. Oil deposits in this area were discovered back in 1885, but funds were needed to start work. Itself n The oil in Sumatra was quite light, and, accordingly, well suited for the production of gasoline, which made production in this region very promising.

The company received the name Royal Dutch due to the fact that the concessionaires enlisted the support of King William III.

Shell Transport and Trading Company Ltd... was founded by two brothers - Marcus Samuel (1st Viscount Bearsted) and Samuel Samuel in 1897 year for the transportation of kerosene from Batumi to the Middle East through the Suez Canal

Their father owned an antique shop in Houndsditch, London. In 1833, he decided to expand the business and began to import and sell sea shells. In honor of these seashells, the brothers decided to name the new company (“Shell” means “seashell” in English).

During World War I, Shell was the main fuel supplier for the British Armed Forces, and sole supplier aviation fuel. In addition, the company supplied 80% of TNT.

In 1919, Shell took control of the Mexican Eagle Petroleum Company and in 1921 formed Shell-Mex Limited, which began marketing products under trade marks Shell and Eagle. Shell Chemicals was formed in 1929. As a result, Shell became the largest oil company in the late 1920s, accounting for 11% of the world's crude oil supply.

In 1931, Shell Mex House was built, which became the head office of the company. In 1932, partly due to the prevailing difficult economic conditions Shell Mex has decided to join forces for retail market Great Britain with British Petroleum and the creation of Shell Mex and BP, a company that existed until 1975.

V 1930 Shell's Mexican assets were forcibly transferred to the local government.

After the German invasion of the Netherlands in 1940 year, the company's head office was moved to Curacao.

V 1952 Shell became the first company in the Netherlands to use a computer. The device, dubbed the Ferranti Mark 1, was assembled and installed at Shell's laboratory in Amsterdam.

Shell acquired the Billiton mining company in 1970, which was subsequently sold in 1994 and is now part of BHP Billiton.

V November 2004 After a period of instability caused by the discovery that Shell is overstating its real oil reserves, the Shell Group's capital restructuring and the creation of a new parent company were announced Royal Dutch Shell PLC, with headquarters and tax seat in The Hague (Netherlands), and registered in London. The merger was completed July 20, 2005... On the same day, Shell Transport & Trading Company PLC was taken off the London Stock Exchange (LSE), and on November 18, 2005, the Royal Dutch Petroleum Company left the New York NYSE.

In 2009, the Iraqi oil services played a tender for the development of the Majnoon field in southern Iran, which contains about 12.6 billion barrels of oil. The result was a consortium led by Shell (45%) and Petronas (30%). Development rights to West Qurna 1 went to ExxonMobil(60%) and Shell (15%).

In February 2010, Shell formed a joint venture with Brazilian Cosan (50/50) called Raizen, which includes all of Cosan's core assets and Shell's Brazilian motor and aviation fuel business.

In March 2010, the company announced the sale of part of its assets, including the production of liquefied petroleum gas, to cover planned costs of $ 28 billion. In June of the same year, Royal Dutch Shell acquired the entire business of East Resources, including gas fields, for $ 4.7 billion.

V 2013 Shell began selling its shale gas assets in the United States. The corporation also canceled a $ 20 billion project to develop a shale gas field in Louisiana. The company's overall productivity in 2013 fell by 38% compared to the previous year. As a result, the value of the company's shares fell by 3%. Shell also sold most of its Australian assets in February 2014.

On April 8, 2015, Royal Dutch Shell announced its agreement to purchase BG Group for $ 70 billion, so far, however, the issue has not been closed.

Shell in Russia

ProjectDescription of the project © siteParticipantsShare
Salym Petroleum Development N.V. Exploration and development of the West Salym, Verkhne-Salym and Vadelyp fields in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug GAZPROM NEFT 50%
Shell Salym Development B.V. 50%
Sakhalin II Development of two fields: the Piltun-Askhotskoye and Lunskoye fields on Sakhalin Island under the Production Sharing Agreement. Operator - Sakhalin Energy Investment Company GAZPROM 50% + 1 share
Shell 27.5% - 1 share
Mitsui 12,5%
Mitsubishi 10%

Shell in the world

  • Africa

Shell began producing oil in Africa in the 1950s. In 1958, production was established in Nigeria. The company also produces oil in Algeria, Cameroon, Egypt, Gabon (at the Rabi-Kounga giant field), Ghana, Libya, Morocco, Nigeria, South Africa and Tunisia. In August 2014, the company disclosed information about the sale of its stake in four fields in Nigeria.

  • Asia


Malaysia

Shell began development of its first oil well in Malaysia in 1910 at Miri, Sarawak. Today, on the site of this oil mine, there is a monument called the Grand Oil Lady. In 1914, Shell built the first refinery in Malaysia and laid a pipeline to Miri.

In 2012, there were 900 Shell filling stations in the country, and the processing capacity was about 100 thousand barrels per day.


Philippines

In the Philippines, Royal Dutch Shell operates on behalf of its subsidiary Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corporation, which has interests in the Pandacan oil storage facility and other key assets.


Singapore

Singapore is the hub of Shell's Asia-Pacific operations. Shell Eastern Petroleum limited (SEPL) has refining facilities at Pulau Bukom and Shell Chemicals Seraya operates on Jurong Island.

  • Europe


Ireland

Shell began selling oil to Ireland in 1902. Exploration and production is carried out by Shell E&P Ireland (SEPIL) (formerly Enterprise Energy Ireland) headquartered in Dublin, which was acquired in 202. The company's main project is the Corrib gas field on the northwest coast. However, during the implementation of the project, Shell faced a number of difficulties related to the construction of onshore pipelines and obtaining licenses.

In 2005 Shell transferred its entire fuel sales business in Ireland to Topaz Energy Group.


United Kingdom

In the UK-owned North Sea, Shell has interests in more than fifty oil and gas fields, 30 offshore production platforms, 30 subsea stations, two floating oil production and storage platforms, an offshore terminal and three onshore gas processing plants. The company's enterprises provide 12% of the oil and gas supply in the UK.

  • North America

In America, the business of the Royal Dutch Shell corporation in the USA is represented by Shell Oil Company, which was practically independent until recently, and whose shares were traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). The change came in the 1990s when Shell bought back shares in Shell Oil Company that it did not own.

Royal Dutch Shell did a similar maneuver with Shell Canada, also acquiring shares and implementing a global business model.

  • Australia

In May 2010, Royal Dutch Shell made the final decision to finance the project of the first floating platform producing liquefied natural gas, following the discovery of the Prelude offshore field off the northwest coast of Australia, which contains, according to various estimates, about 850 billion cubic meters of natural gas.

In February 2014, Shell sold its Australian refineries and gas stations to Vitol for $ 2.6 billion. However, Shell is expected to continue to invest in projects in Australia with Chevron Corporation and Woodside Petroleum.

The history of Shell began in 1833, when an English merchant, Marcus Samuel, opened a small shop in London selling various trinkets decorated with seashells (shell in English means shell) and other exotic oriental products. Shell was the name of Samuel's father's shop in London. The venture turned out to be profitable, and Samuel organized the delivery of seafood from the Far East using his small coastal fleet. The ships en route from the metropolis to the colony carried various cargoes on board, including oil products. Samuel, being a talented businessman, saw a great future in the oil business during the period of its practical birth. After his death, in 1870, the business passed to his sons, who in 1878 founded their own company.

The circle of activities of the Samuel brothers expanded rapidly, especially after Markus Samuel Jr. visited Batumi in 1890, from where Baku oil was exported. He decided to take on the transportation of oil around the world using tankers.

The world's first oil tanker was built in Russia at the Baku shipyards and was called "Zoroaster", in memory of the Zoroastrians - fire worshipers, the ancestors of modern Armenians. Samuel was shocked when he saw the Russian tanker.

Having turned out to be a very quick-witted businessman, already in 1892 he managed to build his first tanker called "Murex" with a displacement of 5 thousand tons at one of the British shipyards. In commemoration of this event, the lead tanker of Shell's oil fleet is now called Murex. The key point is that the design of the tanker invented by Marcus Samuel excluded the threat of spontaneous combustion of oil products. In addition, "Murex" was registered by the "Lloyd" agency and met the stringent requirements of sea transportation through the Suez Canal, (which previously could not be achieved by any oil company), through which it was planned to transport oil and other oil products. The Murex made its first voyage in August 1892 with a cargo of 4 thousand tons of Russian kerosene on the Batumi-Singapore-Bangkok route.

That is why the first "branded" product supplied by Shell to Far Eastern consumers in early 1893 was Russian kerosene.

Oil transportation also gave rise to new problems - in the ports of the Far East, the enterprising Samuel built large oil storage tanks. And also factories for the production of packaging, which local residents used for a variety of purposes, including for the manufacture of roofs.

By the late 1990s, Samuel's oil business had grown so much that he founded a separate company in 1897 called Shell Transport and Trading Company Ltd. But the creation of a world-class oil corporation was still a long way off. Marcus Samuel still had a powerful enemy in the face of the American monopoly Standard Oil. The need to resist American expansion became the basis for the rapprochement between Shell and Royal Dutch, which Samuel once viewed as nothing less than a dangerous competitor. Royal Dutch Petroleum was established in 1890 under the auspices of the King of the Netherlands, who developed a rich deposit on the island of Sumatra and fiercely competed with Shell for markets. However, history was pleased to dispose of the fate of these two companies in its own way.

In 1902, after lengthy negotiations, Shell and Royal Dutch created the Asia-based Petroleum concern, the goal of which was to expand the trade in oil and petroleum products, including Russian-made, in the Far East region. In 1907, the capital and interests of Royal Dutch Petroleum and Shell Transport & Trading K. were finally united, which served as the foundation of the corporation known throughout the world today as Royal Dutch / Shell. In 1900, Henry Detering (1866-1939) became the managing director of this company, and then the chairman of the board of directors, who was later called "the oil Napoleon." Detering was a supporter of the Shell partnership. On his initiative, in 1907, the capital of Royal Dutch and Shell was merged, and a new company was founded with two head offices in London and The Hague.

In the combined concern, 60% of the shares were owned by Royal Dutch, and 40% by Shell. This ratio has been maintained to this day.

A period of growth soon began. The scope of the concern was constantly expanding, new deposits of crude oil were developed, scattered almost all over the world. Powerful oil refineries were controlled by the center in order to more prompt demand for oil products. The rights to oil production were acquired in Romania (1906), Russia (1910), Egypt (1913), Venezuela (1913) and some other countries and regions.

In 1912, the concern entered the US domestic market, starting the development of oil fields and the construction of oil pipelines. In connection with the development of sea and road transport, Shell relied on the production of fuel oil and gasoline and was not mistaken, which brought him enormous profits.

In 1919, British pilots John Alcock and Arthur Whitten-Brown made the first non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean on a Shell fueled plane.

The First World War somewhat slowed down the company's rapid ascent to the oil Olympus, but after its end, active growth again. Companies are established in the USA, the Middle East, Malaysia, East and South Africa. In the early 1930s, Shell took the first steps in the development of the production of petroleum-based chemicals. By the end of the 1930s, Shell was producing about 600,000 barrels of crude oil per day, which was more than 10% of world production.

The years of World War II were not easy for Shell. The Netherlands was occupied by Germany. Romania and the Far East were also out of reach for the company.

Shell has actively worked with allied governments to ensure an uninterrupted supply of aviation and motor gasoline, as well as fuel oil to all military fronts.

The chemical company Shell Chemical Corporation has established the production of butadiene for the manufacture of synthetic rubber. During the war, all of the company's tankers came under the command of the government, as a result, in 1945, Shell was missing 87 of its ships.

After the end of the war, the concern set about restoring the destroyed enterprises and coped with this task quite quickly. The build-up of refining capacities began. The production of petroleum products has increased in almost all regions, especially in Venezuela.

In the early 1950s, the world economy felt the need for new sources of crude oil. The concern launched prospecting and exploration work in Algeria, Trinidad, offshore British Borneo. Fields were discovered in the Netherlands (Schunebeck), Canada, Colombia, Iraq. The increased volumes of oil production, naturally, entailed the construction of new oil refineries, the largest of which were built in the Dutch port of Pernis, the French city of Rouen, Cardone (Venezuela), Geelong (Australia), Bombay.

In the 1950s, Shell already accounted for one-seventh of the world's petroleum product production, the output of which has been steadily increasing. More powerful and capacious tankers (up to 200 thousand tons) were required to transport oil. Soon such tankers became the main unit of the Shell fleet.

In 1959, a joint venture between Shell and Exxon discovered one of the richest natural gas fields in the Dutch town of Gronningen. Gas production has become another area of ​​the diversified Shell concern. By the early 1970s, Gronningen produced half of the gas consumed in Western Europe.

In the mid-1960s, Shell explored several unique gas fields in the North Sea at once, which required the development of a new technology for sea transportation of liquefied gas. In the 1970s, Shell and its partners managed to deliver five million tons of liquefied gas from Brunei to Japan. Shell has pioneered large-scale gas liquefaction and long-distance shipping projects. In the 1980s, the export of liquefied natural gas produced by the concern grew significantly - in 1989, the largest project for the development of the north-western shelf of Australia and the supply of liquefied natural gas to Japan was carried out.

In addition to gas, in 1971 the giant Brent oil field was explored in the North Sea in extremely difficult natural conditions. Exploration and development in the North Sea later became Shell's largest industry. Severe weather conditions dictated the need to use high-tech equipment for oil production. Following Brent, Shell discovered the Cormorant (1972), Dunlin (1973), Terne (1975) and Ayder (1976) deposits. Brent's development is considered one of the most technologically complex and costly projects in the history of mankind.

In the mid-1970s, oil demand dropped. The events in Iran 1978-79 and the related restrictions on oil supplies - all this gave rise to the need to search for alternative sources of energy. Gas consumption in Europe more than doubled in the late 1970s. Shell and its partners provided 50% of this amount.

Expanding the range of its activities, the concern strengthened its positions in the coal and metallurgical industries. In 1981, a large magnesium plant was commissioned in Wendam (Netherlands).

During the 1980s, Shell focused on product and service differentiation, increasing production efficiency through the automation of distribution and sales networks.

During the same period, Shell switched to the production of unleaded gasoline, a cleaner fuel.

By the end of the decade, the company was processing about three million barrels of crude oil at its refineries. A quarter of the group's total income came from chemical production. Still, the 1980s were unprecedented in the development of offshore fields in the North Sea. The Troll gas field, the second largest in Europe, was discovered in its Norwegian sector. The two largest oil and gas fields, Bulwinkle and Auger, were explored in the Gulf of Mexico. In 1989, the daily oil production from the Bulwinkle platform, installed at a depth of 412 m, reached 8 thousand barrels. In 1994, another gigantic platform, Auger, was built on pre-tensioned supports, the height of which was 872 m. It is the tallest permanent structure in the world on the seabed.

To maintain its competitive advantage, Shell is ready to make drastic changes in its structure. These changes include the July 2005 merger of the parent companies Royal Dutch and Shell Transport into a single entity, Royal Dutch Shell plc.

Shell logo

For more than a century, the word "shell" or "Shell", the scallop shell emblem and distinctive colors - red and yellow - have been used to identify the brand and promote the company's reputation. These symbols represent the quality of products and services, professionalism and values ​​around the world.

At the origin

The name of the company was Shell, and each Samuel tanker carrying kerosene to the east bore the name of a different shell. The scallop may have been taken from the family crest of a business partner, Mr. Graham, who imported Samuel's kerosene to India and became director of The Shell Transport and Trading Company. After moving to Santiago de Compostela in Spain, the Graham family adopted the shell of St. James as their coat of arms. Over time, the shape of the seashell has gradually changed in line with graphic design trends. Designer Raymond Lowy created and introduced the existing logo in 1971.

Why red and yellow?

In 1915, the California-based Shell company built service stations for the first time, and they needed to differentiate themselves from the competition. They used vibrant colors that would not be offensive to the residents of California: due to the state's close Spanish ties, red and yellow were chosen.

Today's colors emerged years later, with the introduction of Shell's vibrant, memorable reds and yellows in 1995 for the company's new retail products. The scallop remains one of the most famous brand symbols in the 21st century.

 

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