Who are Halliburton's competitors?

[Ivory_Tower]

This is a question I've been wondering about for a while (ever since I heard about the no-bid contracts, I guess).

The reason I'm asking: I was discussing this with a friend of mine a couple of weeks ago. He had gotten his degree in Petroleum Engineering (I think that's what it was called) in the mid-eighties. He told me that at that time, Halliburton was the only American company that did that kind of work (oil extraction infrastructures, I guess?), so he wasn't surprised that the contracts in Iraq were no-bid.

He also told me that their only major competitor was a French company (who, I would venture to guess, had the Iraq contracts before the war). To me, that's even more interesting than sole-sourcing Halliburton. It could partly explain France's opposition to the invasion and also this administration's cavalier attitude toward pissing off the French.

Of course, his information is nearly twenty years old, so I don't know how things have changed since then.

So, what other companies do the same type of work as Halliburton today?

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

1. On 60 minutes they just covered another Texas company

that did many of the same things for less money during Gulf War1. I didn't get the name of the company.

[Ivory_Tower]

3. D'oh!

Another show besides "The Simpsons" that I miss!

Yeah, that's what prompted my post -- I saw people mentioning that the Halliburton piece was coming up, and it reminded me of the conversation I had. I was going to post it back then, but got distracted by something shiny.

Thanks. I'll have to check the web for a transcript.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

6. Allow me to save you some time, my friend

:D
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=380623#380677

[Ivory_Tower]

9. Thanks!

40MB -- it's times like this I'm glad I got DSL!

[Ilsa]

13. The one from Lubbock or

Amarillo? Yeah, owned by that old Texas cowboy. He was pissed.

[pruner]

2. American citizens

at least when it comes to getting money/services from the federal government.

[gristy]

4. Hahahahahahahahaha!!!!

Halliburton's competitors!??? Oh, boy. That's rich. They don't have no stinkin' competitors!

[Don_G]

15. Halliburton Has An Exclusive 5 Year Contract

No competition!!!!!

[KFC]

5. Here

http://biz.yahoo.com/p/_energy-oilsrv.html

The French company is probably Schlumberger.

[catzies]

10. Yup. Schlumberger is huge.

n/t

[Ivory_Tower]

11. Yes, Schlumberger, that was it

Thanks for the link. Interesting.

[jburton]

7. Besides the Mafia? n/t

[Wwagsthedog]

8. A couple of links

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=hal&x=15&y=15

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/quote?ticker=slb&x=14&y=11

Schlumberger may be the "French" company referred to but it is incorporated in the Netherlands Antilles if I'm not mistaken. One economic reason that France opposed the war may have been that Iraq owed them a lot of money.

[cosmicdot]

12. snooping around hoovers.com - a couple of names show up

Top Competitors

Baker Hughes
Schlumberger
Technip

it mentions
"36 Competitors Listed For Halliburton"
but, to link to that info, one has to have a subscription
however

by linking to Baker Hughes, Schlumberger, etc., "other" names emerge, such as

BJ Services
Smith International

http://www.hoovers.com/free/co/factsheet.xhtml?COID=10697

good to see Halliburton becoming a household name :)
and, the association with Sneer Cheney

[cosmicdot]

19. some links to Halliburton info

"Halliburton, the file, 2 Sept. 2002"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/cgi-bin/duforum/duboard.cgi?az=show_thread&om=6540&forum=DCForumID38&archive=

NY Times (requires free sign up)
"In Tough Times, a Company Finds Profits in Terror War"

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/13/business/13HALL.html?ex=1064289600&en=0d17d064b744b939&ei=5070

"The War on Terrorism's Gravy Train -
Cheney's Former Company Wins Afghanistan War Contracts"

http://www.corpwatch.org/issues/PID.jsp?articleid=2471

"Force Provider: The Base in a Box"
http://www.corpwatch.org/issues/PID.jsp?articleid=2468

[skeptic9]

14. Cheney's Energy Task Force discussed the list of international competitors

... for Halliburton, long before the US invasion. Attendees of the Cheney-Ken Lay White House Energy Task Force received lists of international competitors for Iraqi drilling and reconstruction rights. (See http://www.judicialwatch.org/071703.b_PR.shtml -- click through the URL at the bottom pointing to oil maps of Iraq they got, too!). The list includes Total Elf Aquitaine (France), Preussag (Germany), CNPC (China), Ranger (Canada), and dozens of other big corporations capable of managing multi-billion-dollar projects.Though Halliburton's Brown Root division has a long history of work in Vietnam and other places where US armed forces paved the way, there's no shortage of international competition.

[Ivory_Tower]

16. Yeah, but there was no way a foreign firm would get the work

This administration would have never awarded an Iraq oil contact to a non-US firm. But if there were other American competitors out there, the no-bid award looks even more suspicious. And from the other posts in this thread, it looks like there were other American firms capable of this work.

[Don_G]

17. Halliburton Has An Exclusive 5 Year Contract With The US

There is no competition and will be no competition until the contract expires in 3 or 4 years.

[skeptic9]

18. Are huge contracts written in stone? What's to stop the White House...

... from pressuring Halliburton to SUBCONTRACT some of that work to other companies, under a threat of canceling the whole thing? Pressure on President Rove can lead to pressure on Halliburton to share the White House's generosity with the Treasury's borrowed money.

[TreasonousBastard]

20. Somebody already mentioned Schlumberger...

but how could you forget Bechtel?