Moving 40 rigs 400 times a year takes the perfect partner, says Warith Al-Kharusi, Logistics Manager, Petroleum Development Oman
Warith Al-Kharusi has a big job. As Logistics Manager for Petro-leum Development Oman (PDO) he oversees the logistics functions of Oman’s national oil drilling company. This includes cargo haulage, passenger movements, leet management and emergency response across a more than 200,000 sq kilometre country. “It’s a US$300 million a year activity, and
to do it on your own is very difficult,” says Al-Kharusi. 
But in 2005, his job became easier when PDO made the decision to outsource the movement of its rigs and cargo such as pipelines to Bahwan DHL Exel Supply Chain. DHL essentially serves as a 4PL, managing various sub-contractors and service providers to move rigs over 400 times per year. “We’re talking about 500 next year,” adds Al-Kharusi.
Warith Al-Kharusi
By 2006, PDO could already seeing the value the DHL relationship was adding to its business. Rigs were moving faster, and thus sitting idle for less time and drilling for oil more. “We’ve got about 40 rigs that we move, and if we move them better we can actually take one rig out of the sequence,” he explains. “It’s not about only creating cost reduction but also value creation.”
The transition to outsourcing, however, was not so easy. “We had to invest a lot of time in articulating what we needed out of the relationship,” he says. “We created the right expectations, and we created the right suppliers.”
