Read elsewhere that Landmark is for sale. The management made questionable acquisitions to replace the ageing cash cows such as TOW production application. Clients started moving to competitors' products one by one. Now 3 years after the acquisition, not a single client switched; many of them spent a good deal of time and effort to make it work; But gave up and demanded refund of money paid. Yet the guys behind survive. Millions of dollars were lost in keeping a big team in Houston and development centers offshore.
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There is a good chance that the buyer of Landmark is GE.
GE's Next Acquisition Could Be in Oil and Gas: Here Are the Target
When General Electric chairman and CEO Jeffrey Immelt spoke at energy conference IHS CERAWeek last month, he made his intentions clear: His company wants to get bigger in the oil and gas industry. He said the company's balance sheet is strong and it's time to "fill in" its portfolio.
"We're not hamstrung by the cycle," he said. "It's an opportunity to be an even more important part of the industry.
Great fortunes are made in troughs, or so the saying goes, and the oil and gas industry is going through a doozy. Oil prices have fallen 70%, companies are laying off workers -- 1,000 announced at Anadarko Petroleum just this week -- and production is being halted. So it's a good time for a contrarian like Immelt to jump in and pick up some bargains. "We're in a period of slow growth and volatility," Immelt said. "You need courage to act."
The company certainly has the balance sheet to do a deal. It is expected to have more than $150 billion in cash once it's through its divestiture program, which includes its property portfolio and its financial services units. It's all part of Immelt's plan to move GE away from risky businesses and toward becoming a "simpler, more valuable" company involved in solving the world's problems.
"Our best days are ahead," he said last year.
GE spokesman Seth Martin wouldn't comment beyond what the company has said previously: "We're always evaluating opportunities." But analysts say the most likely candidates are the assets regulators are forcing Halliburton and Baker Hughes to sell in exchange for a blessing for their merger. They most likely include Baker Hughes' business that involves "completions," or finishing oil and gas wells once they're deemed promising, and Halliburton's drill bit and directional drilling business, which involves controlling the direction of the drilling, including horizontally, to get more out of a well, both onshore and off. They are global franchises that are number one or two in their respective segments and would instantly make GE the third largest oilfield services company after Schlumberger and Halliburton-Baker Hughes.
There are other options out there for the software that landmark offers. The operators could live without landmark.
Landmark is owned by Halliburton and well known as a key vendor in the O&G industry, especially those trying to compete in Acquisition/Divestitures or Business Development scenarios. Tow is one of their products that captures and tracks production. With prices falling, and companies cutting back, they may also cut back on licences to this type of software applications in order to further cut expenses. How can anyone afford premier applications if oil markets continue to stay low and ultimately lose the experienced employees who knew how to make these applications hum?
What the hell are you talking about