There is no doubt that you already have some very talented people working in your organization. They've been working hard to help increase production and profits in your operation, and now it's time to help them. Added stress from fewer skilled workers in the workforce can escalate to burn out, safety risks, and lost production that can all quickly add up to lost time, lost profits and serious risk factors to people everywhere.

Upskill your people (help people increase their skills) and optimize their own performance with a few easy to implement ideas that can take your operations to the next level of performance in a very short amount of time - all while increasing your people's abilities, confidence and produce positive short and long term outcomes.

You may be frustrated with your company’s slow crawl instead of fast track into the digital age, and you've even tried a few pilot projects in a kind of siloed effort that never really provided you with any return. Maybe you tried some field automation, but then didn't have a perfected way to get that data to everyone who could greatly benefit from it; so it got you no where on your digital journey, and it didn't set you up to get budget approval for future projects you had in mind.

A recent McKinsey report says siloing—doing a little automation here and a little there—is a top frustration with forward-thinking executives. They’re looking to boost productivity in light of reduced workforces, but need some help to get a unified effort.

Compressed air is a key component of today’s factory production. Because massive, power-demanding compressors are required to keep this key resource flowing it is important for factories to carefully manage how they use it—and to prevent leaks that could waste significant amounts of power.

Take for example a plant that combines the stretch blow molding (SBM) process for making plastic bottles with bottling in a single location. This provides great efficiencies while demanding a lot of pneumatics, both for blowing/bottling and for operating valves and machinery.

Over the past few years there has been an increase for packaging manufacturing all over the globe; many of us now order food to be delivered that comes in a special container to keep it warm (or cold). We order all sorts of things from Amazon, Lazada, Alibaba, or Otto; but it all comes in a special package to help it arrive safely in one piece, and the list goes on and on and continues to grow in popularity everyday.

But where does all that packaging come from to get us our goods in great condition without them looking like they were dragged through the mud?

This is where Packaging manufacturers come into the light; they create all the awesome packaging to be sure we get our orders in perfect condition; no matter what it is, or how far it traveled to get to us. These are the companies that make other companies shine since there is few other disappointments as receiving damaged goods as the end user/buyer.

Operational data can be very messy and often times lives in many different places: internal systems, spreadsheets, email messages, hand written notes, even mental notes, and more. You need a way to manage all this information so it's available to you and your authorized users at any time for any reason.

By pooling all your operations data together into a cloud-based platform and utilizing cloud applications, you can simplify and cut down on the number of systems you need to support your operations. We've all heard the saying 'sometimes more is less' right? It totally proves true when it comes to your operational data; simplify where it's all combined and stored to get the most from it all.

Maybe you’ve declared your intention to digitally transform your production. That’s great. It’s a growing trend and it will really boost efficiency. But the jury is still out on whether to do it in-house or to let us do it for you.

I have a question that may clarify that decision for you:

What are you good at?

You’re good at evaluating leases, considering how to economically produce a field and to get that oil and gas to market. If you were to jump into the field of developing a cloud based platform, what would that look like in terms of hiring, training and implementing?

“Zedi is light years ahead of the competition!” This statement has become a common theme at our client meetings. Producers urgently require the deployment of a proven digital strategy; however, implementation has historically lagged for weeks, months or even years when working with other vendors.

These producers typically receive conflicting information on exactly what is involved in the deployment, what is needed from them, the timing of it all, and what their technology partner is truly capable of bringing to the table to help with it all.

We set out to change that.

Do-it-yourself field automation sounds great until you realize all the mind-bending decisions involved.

I think of this when I go to a favorite restaurant—a fast-casual place where you line up in front of a massive menu board loaded with salads, sandwiches, soups, potatoes and…..on and on.

It’s obvious whenever the person in front of me is a first-timer. Eyes wide, hands shaking, lips moving without a sound. Maybe they’re praying. Because I felt that way on my first couple of visits, I can help them. I know how to navigate the menu.

We can easily help you know how to navigate the automation menu, including tank monitoring, because we’ve ordered before. We know the secret ingredients of sensors, the special sauce of communication links and the table setting of data storage and reporting. In short, you sit down, take care of your work—and we’ll order for you.

If you ask around for a single term that describes getting the right production data, most engineers in oil and gas would hesitate to say “simple” or “straightforward.” Here at Zedi, data is our thing; we live it and breathe it – heck, some of us even dream about it - you can’t control when innovation may strike! Our customers continue to benefit from solutions that are streamlined and straightforward thanks to our software development and engineering people.

After all, the value of production data could not be simpler: optimizing production leads to increased profitability. That said, here are my top 5 tips to help increase your oil and gas production:

The basic formula for increasing oil well production is pretty clear to me: the more the pump runs, the more oil it pumps. The real issue is how to reduce downtime, so that it runs more, and pumps more.

What wasn't clear to me is why on earth about 100,000 pumpjacks in the US alone are not monitored—other than by someone driving all the way out to the well site every couple of days. With that method, a pump may have been down, or even worse leaking for a day or so before it’s noticed by anyone. That’s several hours of production time that can never be recovered.