Energy, Petrochemicals and Plastics 20

Friday, June 7, 2019

Energy, Petrochemicals and Plastics 20

1              Global gas demand to grow at 1.6% per year until 2024: IEA
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-gas-iea-idUSKCN1T80JN

Global gas demand is expected to grow at a rate of 1.6% a year until 2024, fueled by Chinese consumption which will account for over a third of the demand growth during the period, the International Energy Agency said on Friday.

2              Quartet forms Northern Sea Route LNG transportation partnership
https://www.lngworldnews.com/quartet-forms-northern-sea-route-lng-transportation-partnership/

Russia’s Novatek, China COSCO Shipping Corporation, Sovcomflot and Silk Road Fund have signed an agreement regarding the Maritime Arctic Transport (MArT) joint venture.

3              China’s Demand For Gas “Almost Infinite”
https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/commodities/

Last year, the buzz term in the natural gas world was the alarmist cry of “stranded assets”, with headlines shouting that overproduction of shale oil and gas in North America would leave markets oversaturated with product and infrastructure soon to become obsolete thanks to the rise of more affordable wind and solar. Since then, there have been just as many think pieces and reports tempering the stranded asset panic with assurances that natural gas is here to stay.

4              US promotes ‘freedom gas’ but prices, not politicians, drive LNG flows
https://blogs.platts.com/2019/06/05/us-freedom-gas-prices-lng-flows/
The US is describing its growing LNG exports as “freedom gas”, giving America’s allies “a diverse and affordable” clean energy source, but prices, not politicians, will decide where that LNG flows.

5              Oil Just Had Its Worst Run Since 2008
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Oil-Prices/Oil-Just-Had-Its-Worst-Run-Since-2008.html

Oil has entered a bear market as fears of an economic downturn mount. The fundamentals look much tighter than the swoon might suggest, but the supply and demand picture is also beginning to look more negative.

6              Oil rises as Saudi Arabia signals OPEC deal extension
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-oil-idUSKCN1T801T
Oil prices rose on Friday, climbing further from five-month lows hit this week amid signs that OPEC and other producers could extend their output reduction deal.

7              U.S. Targets Venezuelan Oil Blending With Latest Restrictions
https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/commodities/
The U.S. is stepping up efforts to cripple Venezuela’s oil industry, this time by targeting the petrochemicals the country’s state-owned oil company needs to keep its crude exports flowing.

8              Oil Industry Banks On Shaky Plastic Bet

https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Oil-Industry-Banks-On-Shaky-Plastic-Bet.html

Even as oil demand is beginning to weaken this year due to a brewing economic slowdown, the oil industry faces a longer-term threat to oil demand as bans on plastic begin to multiply.

9              Oil giants bet their futures on plastic — just in time for a plastic-trash crackdown
https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-oil-plastic-petroleum-environment-20190606-story.html

As the world strives to wean itself off fossil fuels, oil companies have been turning to plastic as the key to their future. Now that’s looking overly optimistic.

10           Oil Sands Production To Hit 4 Million Bpd By 2030
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Oil-Sands-Production-To-Hit-4-Million-Bpd-By-2030.html
Crude oil production from Canada’s oil sands could rise by a million barrels from today’s average daily rate to as much as 4 million bpd in 2030 despite a slowdown in the annual growth rate, IHS Markit has forecast.

11           As Permian oil production turns lighter, price outlook darkens
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-oil-permian-idUSKCN1T71B7
The United States may now be the world’s biggest crude producer, but the oil being produced in its prolific Permian basin is increasingly too light in density for domestic refiners or for exports, eroding prices for these orphan barrels.

12           EIA tool compares individual power plants’ generation, cooling water use, and emissions

Today in Energy
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=39732

EIA’s electric power sector surveys collect plant-level information on several attributes of U.S. power plants, including cooling water use and emissions data.

13           LyondellBasell, Braskem end merger talks
https://www.chron.com/business/energy/article/LyondellBasell-Braskem-end-merger-talks-13933334.php

After nearly a year of talks and significant delay, petrochemical makers LyondellBasell and Braskem have mutually ended talks over a potential merger.

14           Latest setback to Enbridge’s Line 3 pipeline is more bad news for oilfield workers, industry warns
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/minnesota-rejects-enbridge-line-3-1.5160404
A court ruling in Minnesota that could further delay Enbridge Inc.’s Line 3 oil pipeline replacement project spells more bad news for Canadian oilfield workers, says the CEO of the Petroleum Services Association of Canada.

Business Intelligence and Analytics 20

Friday, June 7, 2019

Business Intelligence and Analytics 20

1              3 Ways to Streamline and Economize the Manufacturing Supply Chain
https://www.manufacturing.net/article/2019/06/3-solutions-streamling-and-economize-manufacturing-supply-chain

A study conducted by the Material Handling Institute surveyed 1,000 supply chain executives to identify the top technologies projected to shape supply chain processes in the coming years. The answers included cloud computing and storage, inventory and network optimization, predictive analytics and IoT.

2              Data Is the Lifeblood of Sales Intelligence Programs
https://www.informationweek.com/big-data/big-data-analytics/data-is-the-lifeblood-of-sales-intelligence-programs/a/d-id/1334832

Many organizations are going through an analytics evolution. And this data-driven approach is no longer exclusive to technical teams as more business personnel become “citizen” data scientists — yes, even sales teams.

3              Industry 4.0: Why Manufacturers Need to Keep Their Eye on the Long Game
https://www.manufacturing.net/2019/06/industry-40-why-manufacturers-need-keep-their-eye-long-game

An industrial revolution is a fundamental shift in the way industry works that forever changes the way manufacturing is done. However, besieged by bright shiny objects of Industry 4.0, manufacturers should focus on long term goals instead of being swept up by the abundance of new technologies, such as cloud, big data, IoT, mobile, location, additive manufacturing, edge computing, miniaturization, augmented and virtual reality, artificial intelligence (AI), automation, and robotics.

4              8 Industrial IoT Trends of 2019 That Cannot Be Ignored
https://datafloq.com/read/8-industrial-iot-trends-2019-cannot-be-ignored/6452

From manufacturing to the retail sector, the infinite applications of the industrial internet of things are disrupting business processes, thereby improving operational efficiency and business competitiveness. The trend of employing IoT-powered systems for supply chain management, smart monitoring,  remote diagnosis, production integration, inventory management, and predictive maintenance is catching up as companies take bold steps to address a myriad of business problems.

5              How We Can Solve Big Data’s Bias Problem
https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/big-data-ai-bias/
Data analytics and artificial intelligence are transforming our lives. Be it in health care, in banking and financial services, or in times of humanitarian crises — data determine the way decisions are made. But often, the way data is collected and measured can result in biased and incomplete information, and this can significantly impact outcomes.

6              Visualising Geospatial data with Python using Folium
https://www.kdnuggets.com/2018/09/visualising-geospatial-data-python-folium.html

Data visualization is a broader term that describes any effort to help people understand the importance of data by placing it in a visual context. patterns, trends, and correlations can be easily shown visually which otherwise might go unnoticed in textual data.It is a fundamental part of the data scientist’s toolkit. Creating visualisations is pretty easy but creating good ones is much harder.

7              Marketing Metrics for Demand Generation
https://blog.marketo.com/2019/06/why-digital-marketing-kpis-keep-your-demand-generation-campaign-relevant.html

In our previous posts about demand generation, we explored some of the ways to drive an effective demand gen campaign. For our final blog in this series, let’s talk about KPIs—because the cold, hard truth is without metrics, no other aspects of your campaign matter.

8              The Importance of — and How to Calculate — Lifetime Customer Value
https://www.business2community.com/customer-experience/the-importance-of-and-how-to-calculate-lifetime-customer-value-02207695

Lifetime customer value, also called customer lifetime value (CLV), is one of the most important metrics out there. The logic is self-explanatory, so we won’t belabor it because you’re all smart people, but the bouncing ball goes like this:

Energy, Petrochemicals and Plastics 19

Friday, May 31, 2019

Energy, Petrochemicals and Plastics 19

1              Trade wars tip oil toward biggest monthly drop in six months
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-oil-idUSKCN1T1056

Oil was on track for its biggest monthly drop in six months on Friday as U.S. President Donald Trump ramped up trade tensions, weighing on the demand outlook.

2              Can Canada Become Energy Independent By 2030?
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Can-Canada-Become-Energy-Independent-By-2030.html

Andrew Scheer—leader of Canada’s Conservatives who are currently in opposition but leading Liberals in the polls ahead of the October federal elections—has recently outlined his vision for Canada that includes the country becoming energy independent by cutting off all foreign oil imports by 2030.

3              LNG mega-projects face funding evolution
https://www.petroleum-economist.com/articles/midstream-downstream/lng/2019/lng-mega-projects-face-funding-evolution

The shifting risk and reward equations created by LNG’s commoditisation will lead to fundamental changes in financing

4              Shale Drillers Keep On Falling Into The Same Trap
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Shale-Drillers-Keep-On-Falling-Into-The-Same-Trap.html
Despite the hype of lower breakeven prices, and despite the hype around longer laterals, energy digitalization, and other technological breakthroughs, most shale companies are still not profitable.

5              EIA’s new liquids pipeline projects database shows new U.S. crude oil pipeline capacity
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=39672

EIA recently launched a new liquids pipeline projects database that tracks more than 200 crude oil, hydrocarbon gas liquids (HGL), and petroleum products pipeline projects. Rising domestic crude oil production has led to several changes in Gulf Coast crude oil supply and demand patterns, creating a need for more pipeline capacity.

6              Analysis: Potential Reliance, Aramco tie-up seen as ‘match made in heaven’
https://www.hellenicshippingnews.com/analysis-potential-reliance-aramco-tie-up-seen-as-match-made-in-heaven/

Talks for Saudi Aramco to buy a stake in the downstream segment of India’s Reliance Industries are in advanced stages, sources have told S&P Global Platts, a potential tie-up that could open a window of opportunity for both companies to nurture their refining and petrochemical expansion dreams.

7              Total to move ahead with using palm oil at biodiesel refinery
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-total-biofuels-lamede-idUSKCN1SZ1V9

Total is set to start up a biodiesel refinery using palm oil whose planned launch last summer sparked opposition from farmers producing vegetable oil and from environmental activists.

8              ExxonMobil backs LNG imports to world’s biggest exporter
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-australia-gas-outlook-idUSKCN1T00T2
Imports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to Australia – the world’s biggest LNG exporter – now appear “highly realistic” as the country struggles to fill a looming gas shortage, U.S. energy giant Exxon Mobil Corp said on Thursday.

9              Smart Money Turns Increasingly Bearish On Oil
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Oil-Prices/Smart-Money-Turns-Increasingly-Bearish-On-Oil.html

Over the past month, hedge funds and other portfolio managers have been liquidating some of their bets that oil prices will rise, as concerns about the future of global economy grew amid an intensifying U.S.-China trade war.

10           Bechtel scores $9.5 bln Rio Grande LNG EPC deal
https://www.lngworldnews.com/bechtel-scores-9-5-bln-rio-grande-lng-epc-deal/

US LNG export project developer NextDecade has signed two contracts with Bechtel for the engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) of NextDecade’s Rio Grande LNG project in Brownsville, Texas, totaling $9.565 billion.

11           Pemex’s oil exports tumble 11% in April from March
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mexico-oil-idUSKCN1SV007
Pemex’s oil exports dropped by 11% in April compared to the previous month, while production slipped by 0.9%, data from the Mexican state oil firm showed on Friday.

12           Expert insights on choosing the right plastics for medical applications
https://www.plasticstoday.com/medical/expert-insights-on-choosing-right-plastics-medical-applications/16899970660867

The material selection process for a medical application must consider many of the same issues as for any other product—the material’s physical properties, the environment(s) in which the product will be used, the cost of the material, the manufacturing process, and so forth

Business Intelligence and Analytics 19

Friday, May 31, 2019

Business Intelligence and Analytics 19

1              The Secret Sauce Behind Successful Analytics
https://www.business2community.com/business-intelligence/data-integration-the-secret-sauce-behind-successful-analytics-02204698

There’s more data available to businesses now than ever before. But lost at sea in this data ocean are companies that have not yet made strides to better integrate their business with the information at hand. Aberdeen’s Data Integration study findings reveal what changes the industry leaders have made, as well as what challenges companies can expect to face in the near future.

2              4 Keys to Building a Successful Business Intelligence Strategy
https://learn.g2.com/business-intelligence-strategy
If you’re a company with high-growth aspirations, I’m sure you’ve considered looking into business intelligence at least once or twice. When done right, business intelligence leads to faster and more confident decision-making; mainly because these decisions are backed by data. It can save time, money, effort, and open new opportunities.

3              Top 5 Tips For Conducting Successful BI Projects With Examples & Templates
https://www.datapine.com/blog/analytics-and-bi-projects-examples-templates/
BI projects aren’t just for the big fishes in the sea anymore; the technology has developed rapidly, the software has become more accessible while business intelligence and analytics projects implemented in various industries regularly, no matter the shape and size, small businesses or large enterprises. With the help of online data analysis tools, these kinds of projects have become easy to manage and agile in performance.

4              Careful! Looking at your model results too much can cause information leakage
https://www.kdnuggets.com/2019/05/careful-looking-model-results-cause-information-leakage.html

It’s always to use as much data as you can when building machine learning models. I think we all are aware of the issue of overfitting, which is essentially where the model you build replicates the training data results so perfectly its fitted to the training data and does not generalise to better represent the population the data comes to, with catastrophic results when you feed in new data and get very odd results.

5              How Artificial Intelligence Will Disrupt the Financial Sector
https://datafloq.com/read/artificial-intelligence-disrupt-financial-sector/6417

Artificial intelligence thrives with data. The more data you have, the better your algorithms will be. However, just having a lot of data is not sufficient anymore. You also need high-quality data, or in the words of Peter Norvig, you need better data

6              Neural Adaptation: 5 Key Ways to Boost Your Conversions Using this Psychological Principle
https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/neural-adaptation

This is explained by a concept called neural adaptation: a gradual decrease in response to a stimulus due to constant exposure to it. This concept explains why our clothes, shoes, and caps feel like a part of our body and why we feel slight pain when we dip our hand (or body) in slightly hot water but feel almost nothing if our hand remains in the slightly hot water despite its temperature not changing considerably.

7              Who is your Golden Goose?: Cohort Analysis
https://www.kdnuggets.com/2019/05/golden-goose-cohort-analysis.html
Customer segmentation is the technique of dividing customers into groups based on their purchase patterns to identify who are the most profitable groups. In segmenting customers, various criteria can also be used depending on the market such as geographic, demographic characteristics or behavior bases. This technique assumes that groups with different features require different approaches to marketing and wants to figure out the groups who can boost their profitability the most.

8              Six Productivity Tips to Help You Build Healthy Habits
https://problogger.com/build-healthy-habits/

Do you struggle with managing your time? As an online entrepreneur it’s easy to slip into bad habits – moving frantically from one urgent thing to another, or responding to other people’s agendas without much thought about what we need to get done. In this post, I’m sharing six things that have helped me form good habits in my blogging, my business, and many aspects of my life.

Energy, Petrochemicals and Plastics 18

Friday, May 24, 2019

Energy, Petrochemicals and Plastics 18

1              Oil rises towards $69 but set for 2019’s biggest weekly loss
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-oil-idUSKCN1SU01P

Oil rose towards $69 a barrel on Friday after two sessions of losses, but remained on track for its biggest weekly drop this year due to rising inventories and concerns about an economic slowdown.

2              How Trump and Xi Killed the Oil Rally
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/How-Trump-And-Xi-Killed-The-Oil-Rally.html
WTI fell below $60 per barrel for the first time in two months, dragged down by growing fears of a global economic slowdown.

3              Oil Price Fundamental Daily Forecast
https://www.fxempire.com/forecasts/article/oil-price-fundamental-daily-forecast-pressured-by-rising-u-s-stockpiles-concerns-over-slowing-economy-576228

With both WTI and Brent crude oil on the weak side of the 200-day moving average at $60.63 and $68.61 respectively, we expect rallies to be short-lived until enough buyers return to drive prices over this technical level.

4              Natural Gas Price Fundamental Daily Forecast
https://www.fxempire.com/forecasts/article/natural-gas-price-fundamental-daily-forecast-models-showing-some-heat-for-first-week-of-june-576237

The daily chart shows buyers are going to have a hard time initiating a rally due to a series of potential resistance levels at $2.609, $2.619, $2.632 and $2.641. Based on the current set-up, we’re likely to see a range-bound trade until a prolonged period of heat is identified by the weather forecasts.

5              U.S. Energy Storage Capacity Set To Double This Year
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/US-Energy-Storage-Capacity-Set-To-Double-This-Year.html

U.S. grid-connected energy storage capacity this year is set for a twofold increase to 712 MW from 376 MW last year. What’s more, between 2019 and 2024, storage capacity will soar to almost 5 GW, of which 90 percent will be battery storage, IHS Markit said in a new report.

6              Paying some piddling carbon tax will do nothing to defend us from what lies ahead
https://www.cbc.ca/news/opinion/carbon-tax-debate-1.5143916
Sometime this summer, once Prime Minister Justin Trudeau calls the next election, our political leaders will try hard to lead us, like a herd of confused cattle, into a stupid fight and the wrong conversation. Conservative leaders intend to make Trudeau’s carbon tax the big issue.

7              Asia oil refiners mull run cuts with margins at 16-year low for season
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-asia-oil-idUSKCN1ST0QM

Asia’s oil refiners are considering reducing output after margins slumped to their lowest for the season since 2003, according to industry sources and Refinitiv data.

8              Aramco Starts Fuel Trading From U.A.E. With Ex-BP, Pemex Hires
https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/commodities/
Saudi Aramco hired two Singapore-based traders and began dealing in fuel at the Middle East’s main bunkering port as the world’s biggest oil exporter expands further into the trading business.

9              Shell Appomattox Project: Ahead Of Time And Under Budget
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidblackmon/2019/05/24/shell-appomattox-project-ahead-of-time-and-under-budget/
It is no secret that costs of finding and producing oil and gas in North America have dropped dramatically in recent years. Much of this is thanks to improvements in processes and efficiencies within upstream companies; producers have leaned on service providers to reduce billing rates; smarter drilling and hydraulic fracturing programs have played a big role; and of course, the adoption of new, smarter technologies has also been a major key.

10           Weekly resin report: Some processors bank on PE supply surge that will send resin prices lower
https://www.plasticstoday.com/resin-pricing/weekly-resin-report-some-processors-bank-on-pe-supply-surge-will-send-resin-prices-lower/44010771360835

So, how busy were the spot resin markets last week? Well, at mid-month, resin trading was nearly double the historic average, reports the PlasticsExchange (Chicago) in its Market Update. Polypropylene  (PP) prices inched up another cent while polyethylene (PE) prices held firm, having consolidated recent gains at slightly elevated recovery levels.

11           Materials:: Two Performance PE Film Grades for Quality Flexible Packaging Debut at Chinaplas
https://www.ptonline.com/products/materials-two-performance-pe-film-grades-for-quality-flexible-packaging-debut-at-chinaplas-2019

Houston-based ExxonMobil has introduced two new performance PE polymers for high-quality flexible packaging which were highlighted at Chinaplas 2019. Both mark the latest addition to the company’s Exceed family of metallocene hexene LLDPE film resins.

12           This Under 30 Startup Just Raised Another $32 Million To Manufacture Chemicals With Bacteria
https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2019/05/22/this-under-30-startup-just-raised-another-32-million-to-manufacture-chemicals-with-bacteria/

Houston, Texas-based chemical manufacturing startup Solugen, which was cofounded by Forbes Under 30 alumni Gaurab Chakrabarti and Sean Hunt, announced Wednesday that it has raised a $32 million series B round, which the company will use to expand its manufacturing facilities.

Business Intelligence and Analytics 18

Friday, May 24, 2019

Business Intelligence and Analytics 18

1              Will the Real AI Please Stand Up?
https://www.informationweek.com/big-data/ai-machine-learning/will-the-real-ai-please-stand-up/a/d-id/1334670

Make sure that your use of machine learning has more substance than hype. Here’s a framework you can use to help you cut through the noise.

2              Will Programmers Have a Job in the Future? – Future Trends & Prediction
https://medium.com/future-trends-prediction/will-programmers-have-a-job-in-the-future-13b930555f5f

We’ve ushered into the age of technology, and if programming was considered in the 60s and 70s a “geek activity,” today it has become one of the most respectable, high-paying jobs one could get. It is also a sector that is rapidly evolving, and almost everything that has recently been associated with progress has also been associated with programming. That’s great. But programmers are no less susceptible than everyone else when it comes to losing their jobs. In this article, we ask the question, “will programmers still have a job in the future?”

3              Customer Success Leading Indicators and 3 Ways to Turn Around a Failing Product
https://www.business2community.com/product-management/customer-success-leading-indicators-and-3-ways-to-turn-around-a-failing-product-02199901

In the world of SaaS products, there are plenty of ups and downs. Every product goes through the process of checks and balances, and sometimes there are more downs than ups. Just because you have a ‘failing’ product doesn’t mean it’s time to pack up shop. Instead, this could be the perfect opportunity to revamp and refocus your go-to-market strategy. If your product is struggling to keep up with industry demands, it’s time to seek help from the audience that is working with your product every single day: your customers.

4              Building Digital-Ready Culture in Traditional Organizations
https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/building-digital-ready-culture-in-traditional-organizations/

Even though traditional companies find much to admire and learn from in the cultures of born-digital companies, some born-digital qualities are cause for concern. Amazon.com, for instance, launches new businesses quickly and drives repeated efficiency gains in operations. However, it is less admired for what can be seen as uncompromising relationships with publishers, partners, localities, and workers. Uber is revered for its ability to innovate services with agility.

5              Why Location and Demographic Data Play an Essential Role in Predictive
https://datafloq.com/read/location-demographic-data-essential-role-marketing/6395

For most of the past century, marketing was far more of an art than a science. Marketers made decisions primarily off of intuition. Their models have shifted markedly in recent years, as big data plays a more important role in customer outreach and engagement. Predictive analytics is taking data-driven marketing to the next level.

6              6 Industries Warming up to Predictive Analytics and Forecasting
https://www.kdnuggets.com/2019/05/6-industries-warming-up-predictive-analytics-forecasting.html

Predictive analytics and forecasting tools help companies have more confidence about what to anticipate for the future instead of just taking educated guesses and hoping for the best.

7              A Complete Machine Learning Walk-Through in Python: Part One
https://towardsdatascience.com/a-complete-machine-learning-walk-through-in-python-part-one-c62152f39420

Putting the machine learning pieces together

Reading through a data science book or taking a course, it can feel like you have the individual pieces, but don’t quite know how to put them together. Taking the next step and solving a complete machine learning problem can be daunting, but preserving and completing a first project will give you the confidence to tackle any data science problem. This series of articles will walk through a complete machine learning solution with a real-world dataset to let you see how all the pieces come together.

8              A Complete Machine Learning Walk-Through in Python: Part Two
https://towardsdatascience.com/a-complete-machine-learning-project-walk-through-in-python-part-two-300f1f8147e2

Model Evaluation and Selection

As a reminder, we are working on a supervised regression task: using New York City building energy data, we want to develop a model that can predict the Energy Star Score of a building. Our focus is on both accuracy of the predictions and interpretability of the model.

9              Price Forecasting: Applying Machine Learning Approaches to Electricity, Flights, Hotels, Real Estate, and Stock Pricing
https://www.altexsoft.com/blog/business/price-forecasting-machine-learning-based-approaches-applied-to-electricity-flights-hotels-real-estate-and-stock-pricing/

When you give customers advice that can help them save some money, they will pay you back with loyalty, which is priceless. Interesting fact: Fareboom users started spending twice as much time per session within a month of the release of an airfare price forecasting feature. This tool continues to grow conversion for our partner.

10           5 Step Guide to Successfully Implementing Robotic Process Automation
https://www.business2community.com/product-management/5-step-guide-to-successfully-implementing-robotic-process-automation-02201465

Robotic Process Automation has been around for quite some time and is starting to gain momentum in large corporations as they’ve seen the results of cost savings from previous RPA implementations. In this article, we aim to break down what RPA is and how enterprises can go about formulating the right RPA implementation strategy from creating the business case to the initial discovery workshops and implementation to testing, and rollout.

Energy, Petrochemicals and Plastics 17

Friday, May 17, 2019

Energy, Petrochemicals and Plastics 17

1              How should the plastics industry deal with the U.S.-China trade war?
https://www.plasticstoday.com/injection-molding/how-should-plastics-industry-deal-us-china-trade-war/36908952260819

Another deadline has come and gone, and the United States and China are still nowhere near a trade deal. In fact, with strong rhetoric coming from both sides, I’m now sensing we’re closer to economic Armageddon than a storybook ending. I’m preparing my consulting clients for the worst-case scenario.

2              Oil Is Trade War’s Collateral Damage
https://www.rigzone.com/news/wire/oil_is_trade_wars_collateral_damage-14-may-2019-158826-article/

U.S. oil shipments are likely to be a casualty of the trade war with China, even though crude was spared from the latest list of American goods targeted with retaliatory tariffs.

3              LNG Players Weigh Ship Storage Gambit
https://www.rigzone.com/news/wire/lng_players_weigh_ship_storage_gambit-17-may-2019-158859-article/

With so much cheap liquefied natural gas around, traders are again looking at tankers to store the fuel in the hope of better prices.

4              Peak Gasoline Vehicles Is Already Here
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Peak-Gasoline-Vehicles-Is-Already-Here.html

The internal combustion engine has already reached a peak in sales. That startling conclusion comes from a new report from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF). “Sales of internal combustion passenger vehicles have already peaked, and may never recover unless EV growth falters, or major economies such as China invest in significant stimulus programs,” Bloomberg NEF wrote.

5              American Oil Finds New Markets
https://www.rigzone.com/news/wire/american_oil_finds_new_markets-16-may-2019-158849-article/
U.S. crude is reaching new destinations around the world after Chinese buying slowed amid concern that the growing trade dispute between the countries could result in a tax on American oil.

6              Is North America Facing a Pipeline Bubble?
https://www.rigzone.com/news/is_north_america_facing_a_pipeline_bubble-14-may-2019-158829-article/

Spending on proposed North American pipelines could reach $232.5B and raise global pipeline capacity by a third.

7              Coming marine fuel standard will disrupt markets for 1-5 years: BCG study
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-shipping-fuel-study-idUSKCN1SM0AG

The marine industry’s January 2020 shift to using very low sulfur fuel oil (VLSFO) to power ships worldwide will launch a one- to five-year disruption in oil and refined products markets, according to a study released Thursday by Boston Consulting Group.

8              Mexico’s rising oil nationalism faces debt-rating crisis
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mexico-pemex-insight-idUSKCN1SK1TE

The leftist oil nationalist’s ambitions include building a new $8 billion refinery, refurbishing existing refineries and reversing a steady decline in crude production. The problem is that such expensive plans – for the world’s most indebted oil company – have alarmed credit rating agencies, which are threatening to downgrade Pemex bonds to “junk” status.

9              ExxonMobil doubles plant’s manufacturing capacity of speciality elastomers
https://www.hydrocarbonengineering.com/petrochemicals/14052019/exxonmobil-doubles-plants-manufacturing-capacity-of-speciality-elastomers/

ExxonMobil has completed an expansion of its speciality elastomers manufacturing plant in Newport, Wales, which doubles the plant’s manufacturing capacity and increases global manufacturing capacity of Santoprene™ thermoplastic elastomers by 25%.

10           EIA revises its crude oil price forecast upward as supply expectations change – Today in Energy
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=39452

In its May 2019 edition of the Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO), EIA revised its price forecast for Brent crude oil upward, reflecting price increases in recent months, more recent data, and changing expectations of global oil markets. Several supply constraints have caused oil markets to be generally tighter and oil prices to be higher so far in 2019 than previous STEOs expected.

Business Intelligence and Analytics 17

Friday, May 17, 2019

Business Intelligence and Analytics 17

1              Why Cleaner Marketing Data is Essential for IT
https://datafloq.com/read/why-cleaner-marketing-data-is-essential/6369

In a world where B2B companies clash over who gets to be on top in terms of sales, numbers play a pretty big part. More so because variables such as conversion rates and lead traffic can point you to whether you need to up your marketing game. This explains why enterprises are putting much of their resources on lead generation and content marketing. The idea is to generate as many B2B leads as possible. Many would think setting up an efficient B2B lead generation strategy across multiple channels is the main challenge. In reality, it isn’t. Ensuring that your pipeline feeds on “clean” data is still a crucial issue.

2              6 Ways Your Business Can Quickly Upskill Its Workforce
https://digitalmarketinginstitute.com/blog/6-ways-your-business-can-quickly-upskill-its-workforce

Technological advancements are keeping the modern workforce on its toes. The World Economic Forum projects that robotics, autonomous transport, artificial intelligence, and biotechnology will create the biggest changes in industries around the world. Businesses that want to thrive in these changing conditions will need a workforce with new skills, especially digital skills.

3              Why You Need To Focus On Your Email List
https://www.business2community.com/email-marketing/why-you-need-to-focus-on-your-email-list-02199164

While most digital marketers and new entrepreneurs focus on Facebook, Instagram, and other social marketing, there’s still one channel that beats them all – and that’s email.

4              Customer Churn Prediction Using Machine Learning: Main Approaches and Models
https://www.kdnuggets.com/2019/05/churn-prediction-machine-learning.html

Customer retention is one of the primary growth pillars for products with a subscription-based business model. Competition is tough in the SaaS market where customers are free to choose from plenty of providers even within one product category. Several bad experiences – or even one – and a customer may quit. And if droves of unsatisfied customers churn at a clip, both material losses and damage to reputation would be enormous.

5              How companies deploy machine learning models to production today
https://medium.com/@teren_93770/how-companies-deploy-machine-learning-models-to-production-today-7caea620e034

The real transformational benefits of machine learning and data science can only be realized when models are constantly being used in a production environment. Even more value gets generated when there is a feedback loop from production data that is used to retrain a model at high frequency (some companies do daily retrains). However, let’s stay focused on just getting models in production.

6              How to Retain and Regain Your Customers
https://www.business2community.com/customer-experience/how-to-retain-and-regain-your-customers-02198018

Between paid ads, blogging, email and social media marketing, cold calling and more, companies spend a lot of money trying to acquire new customers. However, many act as if the battle is won after the first sale. Not so! Companies that fail to invest in their existing customers are likely to lose their most significant assets. A survey by SAS and Loyalty 360 found that 68% of new business comes from current clients. And, since it can cost five to 25 times as much to attract a new customer as to keep an existing one, keeping your churn rate as low as possible will help you get more mileage out of your budget.

7              Mathematical programming — Key Habit to Build Up for Advancing Data Science
https://www.kdnuggets.com/2019/05/mathematical-programming-key-habit-advancing-data-science.html

The essence of mathematical programming is that you build a habit of coding up mathematical concepts, especially the ones involving a series of computational tasks in a systematic manner.

8              Could machine learning solve attribution challenges?
https://marketingland.com/could-machine-learning-solve-attribution-challenges-261063

If your digital marketing team struggles with attribution, you’re not alone. Nielsen reports that only one out of every four marketers can confidently attribute revenue to their digital efforts. But does that surprise you?

9              The great balancing act: The long and short of B2B marketing
https://www.marketingweek.com/2019/05/16/long-short-b2b-marketing/

The case for long-term thinking has been building since Les Binet and Peter Field’s highly influential IPA report, ‘The Long and the Short of It’. They showed that long-term strategies are more effective at moving the dials that really matter – market share, profit, revenue and so on.

10           4 Tips for Visualizing Your Marketing Data with a Dashboard {New Research}
https://www.convinceandconvert.com/digital-marketing/visualize-marketing-data-dashboard/

Many people have had the experience of going to the optometrist thinking that they don’t need new eyewear because they can see things just fine. Then they try a new prescription and – BOOM – they see details that they never realized they were missing.

Energy, Petrochemicals and Plastics 16

Friday, May 10, 2019

Energy, Petrochemicals and Plastics 16

1              2018 was likely the most profitable year for U.S. oil producers since 2013 – Today in Energy
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=39413

Net income for 43 U.S. oil producers totaled $28 billion in 2018, a five-year high. Based on net income, 2018 was the most profitable year for these U.S. oil producers since 2013, despite crude oil prices that were lower in 2018 than in 2013 on an annual average basis.

2              The Shale Boom Is About To Go Bust
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/The-Shale-Boom-Is-About-To-Go-Bust.html

The shale industry faces an uncertain future as drillers try to outrun the treadmill of precipitous well declines.

3              Pemex to build refinery after outside firms balk at price tag: Lopez Obrador
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mexico-pemex-idUSKCN1SF1UW

Lopez Obrador told reporters at his regular morning news conference that the firms also could not meet the government’s three-year construction time frame, but Pemex could.

4              The Benefits Of Free Trade With Mexico Are Very Real For The Energy Industry
https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaellynch/2019/05/06/the-benefits-of-free-trade-with-mexico-are-very-real-for-the-energy-industry/

Over the last 25 years trade with Canada and Mexico has quadrupled, almost reaching $1.3 trillion and supporting 14 million American jobs through our trading partners. The U.S. energy benefits provided through this agreement makes even more vital that we continue this trade partnership through the U.S.-Mexico-Canada-Agreement (USMCA).

5              From Paris to Omaha: How Occidental CEO out-maneuvered Chevron in Anadarko bid
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-anadarko-petrol-m-a-occidental-hollub-idUSKCN1SF1TW

Occidental Petroleum chief executive Vicki Hollub was caught off guard when U.S. oil giant Chevron swooped in last month with a $33 billion offer to buy Anadarko Petroleum, the oil and gas exploration and production firm she had been wooing for nearly two years.

6              Could the Plastics Industry Become Collateral Damage in a Trade War?
https://www.ptonline.com/blog/post/could-the-plastics-industry-become-collateral-damage-in-a-trade-war

The plastics industry is a global one, and at this time, it’s caught in the transcontinental crossfire of a slow simmering trade war.

7              Plastics resin pricing: Plastics Exchange
https://www.plasticstoday.com/resin-pricing/weekly-resin-report-spot-and-contract-resin-prices-rising-across-board/160564858260755

Prices for both polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP) firmed at least a penny last week, with some extra strength seen in low-density (LD) PE for film. Buyers sought to procure well-priced material in the face of a burgeoning bull run and were more aggressive than sellers, who generally sat back awaiting orders after raising prices about $0.02/lb to start the month of May, reports the PlasticsExchange (Chicago) in its Market Update.

8              DowDuPont to Complete Spin-Off of Companies
https://www.ptonline.com/news/dowdupont-to-complete-spin-off-of-companiesFollowing last month’s spin-off of a ‘new’ Dow, the spin-off of an independent DuPont materials company and the new Corteva agriculture firm will take place June 1.

9              Royal Dutch Shell to invest $ 2 billion per year in Brazil
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-royal-dutch-shell-brazil-idUSKCN1SF18A

Royal Dutch Shell PLC has plans to invest about $2 billion per year in Brazil through 2025, CEO Ben van Beurden told newspaper Valor Econômico in an exclusive interview.

10           ExxonMobil to devote $100 million for research on lower-emissions technologies
https://www.offshoreenergytoday.com/exxonmobil-to-devote-100-million-for-research-on-lower-emissions-technologies/

ExxonMobil said on Wednesday that the company would develop the new technologies with the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the National Energy Technology Laboratory.

11           There’s Tremendous Room For Growth In Offshore Oil & Gas
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Theres-Tremendous-Room-For-Growth-In-Offshore-Oil-Gas.html

The Offshore Technology Conference (OTC) in Houston, Texas celebrates its 50th birthday this week, begging the question – what will the next 50 years hold for the offshore market?

12           Majors Driving Rise in Global Discoveries
https://www.rigzone.com/news/majors_driving_rise_in_global_discoveries-07-may-2019-158775-article/

If the rest of 2019 continues at a similar pace, this year will be on track to exceed last year’s discovered resources by 30 percent.

Business Intelligence and Analytics 16

Friday, May 10, 2019

Business Intelligence and Analytics 16

1              Machine Learning Will Be the Next Big Thing in Supply Chain Management
https://datafloq.com/read/machine-learning-will-next-big-thing-supply-chain/6355

Supply chain management, or SCM, is becoming a more critical job every year, as more consumers turn to e-commerce and warehouses and distribution centers grow. Technology is catching up to the exponential expansion of this industry, but it’s been a slow process. It’s a lot of work for one person, or even a team, to sort through thousands or millions of orders. Machine learning is on the cusp of becoming the next big thing in SCM. How will machine learning change how companies manage their supply chains?

2              5 steps to move closer to one-to-one personalization
https://marketingland.com/5-steps-to-move-closer-to-one-to-one-personalization-260802

“One-to-one marketing” continues to be one of the biggest buzzwords of 2019. At MarTech West last month, it felt like everyone at the conference discussed how their teams are working to foster personalized connections with customers through technology stacks. It also was refreshing to hear that I’m not alone and no one has achieved truly one-to-one marketing – at least not yet.

3              The AI Boom: Why Trust Will Play a Critical Role
https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/coming-ai-breakout-need-rules-road-now/

The exponential pace of technological advancement has made it more challenging than ever before to address its unintended consequences. We have seen it with digital innovation, especially social media, and we are only just beginning to contemplate it with artificial intelligence, which holds the promise of being the most transformational technology of the information era.

4              Wise Practitioner – Predictive Analytics Interview Series: Zeydy Ortiz at DataCrunch Lab
https://www.predictiveanalyticsworld.com/patimes/wise-practitioner-predictive-analytics-interview-series-zeydy-ortiz-at-datacrunch-lab/10381/

DataCrunch Lab, a few questions about their deployment of predictive analytics. Catch a glimpse of her presentation, Will They Stay Or Will They Go? A Customer Lifetime Value Case Study, and see what’s in store at the PAW Financial conference in Las Vegas.

5              How to win customers and influence them so they stick with you
https://www.smartinsights.com/ecommerce/win-customers-influence-them-stick-with-you/

More choice means it not only becomes harder to persuade customers to engage with a particular proposition but also to retain their interest post-transaction.

6              Three steps for using data to crack customer-centricity
https://www.marketingweek.com/2019/05/07/three-steps-data-customer-centricity/

In terms of data availability, marketers have moved from famine to feast in recent years. With information being emitted by washing machine, wrist and everything in between, we’re swimming in our ‘new oil’.

7              How to Help Your Content Team to Have Better Ideas
https://www.searchenginejournal.com/content-team-better-ideas/306601/
Leading or managing a content team can be a highly rewarding experience. However, all too often, it results in a dilemma. You are expected to generate the majority of ideas for your department’s creative output.

8              How Digital Platforms Have Become Double-Edged Swords
https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/how-digital-platforms-have-become-double-edged-swords/

It’s not difficult to see how digital technology and innovation have rapidly transformed our world over the last three decades. If the industrial revolution was built by the factory system, the changes we see today are organized around digital platforms.

9              How is Data Science Changing the World?
https://towardsdatascience.com/how-is-data-science-changing-the-world-db0c4b3cdb8

In this article, you will go through the role that a Data Scientist plays. There is a veil of mystery surrounding Data Science. While the buzzword of Data Science has been circulating for a while, very few people know about the real purpose of being a Data Scientist. So, let’s explore the purpose of Data Science.

10           11 Classical Time Series Forecasting Methods in Python (Cheat Sheet)
https://machinelearningmastery.com/time-series-forecasting-methods-in-python-cheat-sheet/

Machine learning methods can be used for classification and forecasting on time series problems. Before exploring machine learning methods for time series, it is a good idea to ensure you have exhausted classical linear time series forecasting methods. Classical time series forecasting methods may be focused on linear relationships, nevertheless, they are sophisticated and perform well on a wide range of problems, assuming that your data is suitably prepared and the method is well configured.