ENERGY business leader who has worked as CIO of BP Global Refining and International Business , as CIO of BOC Edwards , as a partner at KPMG and for the last nine years has served as Adjunct Professor at Imperial College .

IT central to strategy Pourteymour epitomises the trend we have followed in recent

Information ,” he says . “ My team and I are less concerned these days with IT component management and keeping the lights on ’; we have competent partners to see to that . The emphasis of the ‘ I ’ is now more on intelligence ; innovation ; integration ; influence – and ensuring the integrity of our systems and managing their risk , their security and their compliance !” Like his CEO he is upbeat about the prospects for Seadrill in the market . “ We have good utilisation of our assets , even if day rates have fallen , and we are winning new contracts even if they tend to be shorter term ones than previously .” He sees the response to the difficult market conditions , which have become fiercely competitive by continuing to invest in the best technology to make Seadrill safer , efficient , more competitive and differentiated . One bold outcome of this strategy was the decision to create a strong IT centre of excellence in Seadrill ’ s new service centre in Liverpool which also houses the shared services for the business ’ s human resources and accounting functions .

His IT team comprises around 50 people , half of them now based on Liverpool ’ s waterfront and the other half embedded in the regions close to the operations . The move was an opportunity to implement his vision for the department . “ Before our IT transformation agenda , it was not clear what IT does and why it costs so much . There were challenges

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