Mission critical

By Diana Milne, Editor

He controls a multibillion-dollar IT budget and co-ordinates the activities of 96,000 employees worldwide. But for Patrick Héreng, CIO of Total, the biggest challenge is yet to come as the oil giant prepares to upgrade its entire IT infrastructure. He discusses the task ahead and the threats his organization faces from cyber criminals.

There is only one way for Patrick Héreng to convey the complexity of the operation he oversees, and that is through numbers. When I ask him at the start of our interview to give me some idea of the scale of Total’s IT systems, he sums up it with the following vital statistics: “The global IT budget first of all is around one billion, 200 million Euros. The number of internal IT staff is around 2200. We are managing 1500 physical sites and nearly 80,000 workstations. We probably use more than 2000 terabytes a minute.”

These numbers should come as no surprise. After all, as CIO of Total, Héreng manages the IT operations of one of the world’s largest oil and gas companies with activities in over 130 countries and 96,000 employees worldwide. But they are nonetheless, mind-blowing – and set to become more so since the launch of Perspective 2008 – a colossal project which will see the company replace its entire IT infrastructure, upgrading all components from workstations to network security.

The scale of Total’s IT operation, is due, not only to the size of the company and its work force but to the complexity of its oil and gas exploration and refining activities, which rely heavily on technology for their success.

To support these activities the company’s computing power expanded 17-fold in the past five years – an increase which reflects the increasing pressure on Total to source new oil supplies in an increasingly competitive global market. It uses highly complex technical computing methods such as digital oil field and geophysical analysis to source oil and this year it become the global leader in scientific computing power after acquiring the high performance SGI Altix ICE+ computer from Silicon Graphics, which is capable of making 123 trillion calculations a second “The most complex IT system is the technical computing that is used for E&P,” says Héreng. “An example of that is geophysical analysis such as reservoir modeling to find the oils and optimize the ways of producing it. Digital oil field is another complex IT system. We must find oil and to do that we are doubling our computing capability every year.”

This system creates enormous amounts of data and Héreng says the company has reached around 1,2000 terabytes of storage capacity for technical computing alone. Equally complex are the company’s supply chain and logistics operations, which are supported with solutions from SAP and Microsoft. Describing the scale of the operation, Héreng says: “We have complex IT systems for supply chain, logistics and CRM as well as for petrochemical, refining and marketing activities.

“These systems are mainly based on global SAP. There are now 11 refineries, in 10 countries and 10,000 service stations in Europe. That requires a complex information system especially for the supply chain from the refinery to the service station. And we have millions of customers every day in the service stations so the CRM is complex there also,” he goes on to say.

While Total’s operations require the support of cutting edge IT solutions, the delivery of that technology is often compromised by the remote and often hostile environmental conditions that it operates in. Total’s exploration and production activities span 40 countries with production in 30 of those countries including remote locations in Angola, the North Sea, Venezuala and the Congo. Héreng describes how he is often required to deploy IT solutions in an environment where no infrastructure to support the technology exists, particularly on offshore oil platforms where establishing a telecommunications network poses a major challenge. “Usually we are located in the middle of nowhere and if we look at the infrastructure in those remote areas, there is nothing. Often there is no telecommunications so we have to create telecoms links using different solutions, mainly satellite equipment. Sometimes we deploy marine offshore optical fibers. That is one of the problems – the limitations we face because of the platforms and because in a lot of the countries we can’t find the level of service needed in telecoms – for instance in Africa and Asia – and that means we have to manage internally, locally, or we accept those limitations.”

Given the scale of Total’s global activities the company operates within a decentralized “federated” structure which means operations are managed at business unit level. Total’s IT strategy and policies however are governed by a central IT department with separate IT departments within each business unit. The information systems of each business unit are supported by a common global architecture. This structure, says Héreng, creates its own challenges, particularly when it comes to decision-making. “It’s not so easy to make decisions in this federated IT organization because the decisions must be accepted by every business unit. The current governance model is a mix between a decentralized organization which reinforces the alignment between IT and the business and the globalized architecture which optimizes the cost of the information system,” Héreng goes on to say.

The system will be put to the ultimate test during the upgrading of Total’s IT infrastructure for Perspective 2008 which aims to create uniform IT services across the organization. The project has been two years in the planning and so far the first phase – deploying telephony over IP for 2000 employees – has been completed Héreng admits that the federated structure of the company’s IT operations created challenges during the planning stages of the project. “We have a federated organization. But now we must align the IT processes of everyone in the group.

“This means for instance that if we want to deliver the same level of services to exploration and production and to our specialized chemical subsidiaries, we have to align the way we support users and the way we operate servers. That’s one of the main challenges and we face a lot of resistance to change inside the IT departments. Add to this the fact that we have to co-ordinate the deployment across 130 countries and it’s a very challenging project.”

He hopes however that Perspective 2008 will help to address some of these by providing uniform IT services across Total’s global business units. The project includes the upgrading of employees’ workstations to facilitate better collaboration across the different departments using Microsoft Vista technology. “The goal is to deliver for everywhere the same level of services. We will deploy collaborative workstations and we will deliver to the users the tools to improve collaboration such as instant messaging from computer to computer and integration between the workstation and voice communication. “We will provide unified communications such as a unified email system and WEB 2.0 capability to provide social networking capability to improve collaboration inside the organization.”

But while facilitating better collaboration between Total’s employees will be a major benefit of Perspective 2008 it is not the project’s main aim. That, says Héreng, is to improve Total’s IT security. Protecting Total’s networks is one of the most challenging parts of Héreng’s job – particularly given the huge amounts of highly sensitive data it processes daily and the increased security threats faced by oil companies from international cyber criminals. This, he says, clashes with the organization’s need to improve accessibility to its systems for remote Total employees and customers. “I have to face a paradox which is not simple to solve. We have to open the system but at the same time secure the system more.

“Because of the extended enterprise we have to link our information system to suppliers and customers for billing or procurement purposes.

“Our users also need to access the system from PDAs or non Total workstations and they want to do that everywhere in the world, from Asia and Central Africa to the USA or France. At the same time we have to secure the system. We are not as attacked as banks but there are risks. We have to protect our knowledge and our data and that’s the reason why we increase continually the level of security in the information system. It’s the main reason why we launched the Perspective 2008 program – to be able to face the security threat in the future.”

Perspective 2008 will see Total completely overhaul its security systems extending its current perimeter limit security and integrating it throughout the system. We will have embedded security inside the information system, inside the network, inside the LAN and inside the workstations and data centers,” says Héreng.

“We will deploy a new ID management system which will allow us to have a better management of the rights given to employees, contractors and partners accessing the information system.” He goes on to say that under the new system data will be classified according to the level of protection it requires rather than providing uniform security to all parts of the organization.

A variety of security solutions will be provided by several vendors, which will be integrated by IBM. Héreng is remarkably calm about the mammoth task that lies ahead of him claiming he relishes the challenge of managing IT within what is probably one of the world’s most complex operations. “I enjoy my job although it’s quite complex. One of the major advantages is to be working for a global company. That’s one of the pleasures I have every day.”

I ask Héreng whether Total’s management places a high priority on IT. “No,” he replies. “The high priority for Total is to find oil to renew the resource.” But with technology playing an increasingly crucial role in enabling oil companies to find new oil sources and protect valuable data Héreng’s role is pivotal to the success Total enjoys within a highly competitive global market.

Total at a glance:
With operations in more than 130 countries, Total engages in all aspects of the petroleum industry, including upstream operations (oil and gas exploration, development and production, LNG) and Downstream operation (refining, marketing and the trading and shipping of crude oil and petroleum products).


Total also produces base chemicals (petrochemicals and fertilizers) and specialty chemicals for the industrial and consumer markets (rubber processing, adhesives, resins and electroplating).

In addition, the company has interests in the coal mining and power generation sectors. Total is helping to secure the future of energy through its commitment to developing renewable energies, such as photovoltaic power and marine energy, and second-generation biofuels.

Total in numbers:
•  Fourth largest publicly-traded integrated international oil and gas company in the world.
•  Second largest capitalization on the Euronext Paris and the Euro zone: €136.1 billion at December 31, 2007
•  96,400 employees
•  Operations in more than 130 countries
•  Exploration and production operations in more than 40 countries
•  Producer of oil or gas in 30 countries
•  Approximately 540,000 French individual shareholders
•  2007 sales: €158.7 billion
 
Patrick Héreng was appointed CIO of Total in 2006 and is 51-years-old. He is a graduate of the French school Institut Superieur de l’Electronique du Nord (ISEN), joining the Group in 1998 as Chief Information Officer for the refining and marketing division. Mr. Héreng began his career with a computer manufacturer and then with an information and telecommunication consulting company later becoming the CIO of a large French financial institution.