Unlock the secrets of data standards in the oil and gas industry with insights from Pablo Perez of the Energistics Consortium. Recorded live from The Open Group Summit in Edinburgh, Pablo takes us on a journey from his early days in Venezuela to his impactful role in shaping data communication and transfer through Energistics' integration into The Open Group. Discover how data standards are becoming indispensable with the rise of AI, machine learning, and real-time data streaming, and what this means for the future of the industry.
Are you ready to rethink the role of AI in your career? We explore the transformative impact of AI on business operations and career paths, urging organizations to adapt thoughtfully and strategically. Pablo shares his own career highlights, emphasizing the necessity of lifelong learning and staying updated with technological advancements. His experiences in data aggregation and standards provide a deep dive into the challenges and successes in this evolving field, offering valuable lessons for professionals at all stages of their careers.
Pablo further enriches the conversation by reflecting on his educational journey from Universidad Metropolitana in Venezuela to an executive program at Stanford. He discusses the importance of continuous learning, effective networking, and staying ahead of industry trends. Learn why he advocates for a balanced energy portfolio and how he dispels common misconceptions about the oil and gas industry. Connect with Pablo via LinkedIn and the Energistics website to continue the conversation and gain further insights. Tune in for an episode filled with knowledge, inspiration, and practical advice for navigating the complexities of the energy sector.
Unlock the secrets of data standards in the oil and gas industry with insights from Pablo Perez of the Energistics Consortium. Recorded live from The Open Group Summit in Edinburgh, Pablo takes us on a journey from his early days in Venezuela to his impactful role in shaping data communication and transfer through Energistics' integration into The Open Group. Discover how data standards are becoming indispensable with the rise of AI, machine learning, and real-time data streaming, and what this means for the future of the industry.
Are you ready to rethink the role of AI in your career? We explore the transformative impact of AI on business operations and career paths, urging organizations to adapt thoughtfully and strategically. Pablo shares his own career highlights, emphasizing the necessity of lifelong learning and staying updated with technological advancements. His experiences in data aggregation and standards provide a deep dive into the challenges and successes in this evolving field, offering valuable lessons for professionals at all stages of their careers.
Pablo further enriches the conversation by reflecting on his educational journey from Universidad Metropolitana in Venezuela to an executive program at Stanford. He discusses the importance of continuous learning, effective networking, and staying ahead of industry trends. Learn why he advocates for a balanced energy portfolio and how he dispels common misconceptions about the oil and gas industry. Connect with Pablo via LinkedIn and the Energistics website to continue the conversation and gain further insights. Tune in for an episode filled with knowledge, inspiration, and practical advice for navigating the complexities of the energy sector.
Welcome to Open Comments. With myself, ash, and me, oliver, a show that opens the conversation onto career advice, career journeys, lifelong learning and more. Through this innovative podcast, we'll be offering insightful dialogues with an equal mix of humor and candor. Join us as we embark on an engaging conversational journey with a diverse set of guests from different walks of life. We hope you enjoy our show and look forward to bringing more topics into the fold for you through each episode. Let's dive in.
Speaker 2:
So this is a special episode today because we are recording from the Open Group Summit in Edinburgh, and today we have Pablo Perez, who's part of the Energistics Consortium, a non-profit global upstream oil and gas data standards consortium. So, pablo, please could you tell us a little bit about yourself and what it is that you do?
Speaker 3:
Sure for sure. Thank you, Oliver and thank you, ash. Pleasure to be here and to share a little bit about why I'm here and what I've done with Energistics and the OSDU forum. My name is Pablo Perez. I'm originally from Venezuela. I was born in Caracas almost 50 years ago, I'm 49. And I've been in the oil and gas industry doing drilling data in the last 30 years. So to summarize it like that I started my career at PDVSA in 1994, doing software development. I'm a systems engineer and worked in software development for about six to seven years, then moved to the business development and selling software technology for managed drilling operations. Until ten years ago I decided to start my company Vardash, which focuses on providing top-notch solutions for aggregation, storage, drilling completions and energy in general terms. Thank you.
Speaker 1:
So to start off with, please can you tell us about what made you get into energistics and why you are passionate about it?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I mean just like. As I mentioned before, I mean 30 years doing drilling data. My daughter sometimes jokes like why so much time and doing the same thing? It's a passion because I've been able to see the evolution from handling pretty static data to seeing data streaming in the early stage, streaming real time to now everyone's talking about AI, ml, machine learning, artificial intelligence. Through the same, data streaming started in the early stage, streaming real time to now everyone's talking about AI, ml, machine learning, artificial intelligence. So how we fit that data, handle that data to produce ultimate results is critical.
Speaker 3:
Now why I'm mentioning that, how that connects with energistics is energistics is a consortium, not-for-profit which focuses on defining and regulating the standards for drilling data, production data and reservoir data. So, respectively, which ML for drilling product, ml for production, rescue mail for reservoir. Now what is important I mean I don't want to go too technical here is like what these standards allow you to do is talking the same language, so move data from one software to another in a seamless manner. So, for instance, I mean I'm from Venezuela. If I started speaking Spanish here, we're going to have a problem if you speak a different language, if we were coming from different, completely different regions. The only way we have to communicate seamlessly is English. That's the role of the standards so far.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, we're quite well versed in standards ourselves with the Open Group and we're having conversations the last couple of days about AI and standards. In AI. There's a lot of importance on regulation and legislation. It seems equally as important, especially in the oil and gas industry, to have these standards for data. What kind of experience have you got with the standards? Obviously, you've had quite a journey in your career throughout various different parts of the industry, but what are your thoughts on standards?
Speaker 3:
Standards are present everywhere in our day to day, and even here in the UK, the street, you drive on the left, right. If you drive on the right, as in the US, you're going to have a problem. So standards are extremely important to run our lives. Now for data handling. You just mentioned machine learning, artificial intelligence, AI. It's extremely important to have access to the right data in a timely manner, and standards enable that communication, the transfer of data in a timely manner, effectively.
Speaker 1:
And can you tell us about any exciting updates within Energistics and what you are most looking forward to in the next coming months?
Speaker 3:
Yes, energistics have gone through. I should have mentioned before you asked me about how I got into studies, so I'm gonna connect that with this question. I started interacting with standards the standard data standards from energistics, formerly POSC. Before then, I mean before 2000,. In 2004. 2007, I joined the first Wittemel, or Energistics, meeting in France, in Paris, and I was impressed then by the amount of bright brains in the room. I said, oh my goodness, this is almost like intimidating. So one thing that I'm passionate about with energistics is like how it brings, disregarding your company and competition, anything brings everyone together for a common purpose, which is like developing the best possible standard to have everyone communicate effectively. Over the years I participated with Energistics in different roles as a volunteer Until today.
Speaker 3:
I have been sitting at the board of Energistics for two and a half years and what I'm looking at in this event is the evolution after Energistics transition from completely independent consortium evolution after Energesis transition from completely independent consortium. Transition happened in January 2022 when it became a consortium under the umbrella of the Open Group. So it's been an interesting transition the last two years, with expectable ups and downs. I can say very happily now that we are settled and this event is a great opportunity to see the latest standards being adopted naturally and fluently among not only energy justice community members but also WHO and SDU. It's a bigger audience. It's a bigger challenge.
Speaker 3:
Now again, we mentioned before AI and we play that role of making sure the data can be brought to anyone in a timely manner. So I'm pretty excited to see Many operators, service companies and software vendors getting in the same room talking about the latest needs and how the standards are helping them today. It's not like they're going to help them. It's like how they're helping them today and where they want to take them in the next few months. Sometimes it's like one of the conversations yesterday morning or the presentations morning. The presentations they were talking about a year ago, the spring meeting in London with the Open Group and the discussion about AI was like it's going to happen. Only one year later. It is happening. We can't ignore it. It is happening. So it's a pretty exciting time for the pace of how things are changing.
Speaker 2:
You mentioned something I was going to ask you. You know what makes energistics what it is, but you you mentioned everyone comes under one umbrella to meet for a common goal. It's similar to the open group with open standards, um, but with with the topic of ai, everyone is jumping at it. And what kind of conversations are you having to do with OSDU or energy sticks and standards within the energy sector?
Speaker 3:
Right. I mean, one of the conversations is like how the standards are leveraged within the OSDU platform. We're having a meeting this afternoon which I hope I'm going to see a lot of people not only from the energy justice community but also from OSDU. We're going to be meeting with the OSDU real-time group to discuss how we can leverage the energy transfer protocol, etp, to move data in real time with in and out OSDU. So that's a very strategic conversation for both communities, osdu and energy. So I'm really excited about that. So I'm really excited about that. For several years, the real-time group at OSDU was considering other protocols like Kafka. However, for the need to go to remote locations and move data straight from remote locations to town servers and cloud servers, etp seems to be the very best option Cost-efficiently moving high-frequency data and, among other things, increasing security. So it's a very exciting time in that respect for what we're going to be seeing this afternoon.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it's certainly been an exciting topic of conversation for the other areas of industry at the Open Group event, but the common theme that I took up from yesterday was to use it safely and securely and make sure you're using AI correctly rather than just jumping on it and potentially harming results in the long run.
Speaker 3:
Correct. That's a very good point and you asked part of the previous question also is what is the role of the standards with AI Helping bring the right data in a timely manner to audience and consumers Right? So to me, the principle of being able to move data talks about being able to access the right data set, and otherwise, I mean for AI it's critical to have the right data, Otherwise we're garbage, inaging, garbashout. So in that respect, our role, I think, is sometimes seen as probably small, but it's very high impact and we're working hard as the energy community to integrate better with the OSDU community so standards can be better leveraged to facilitate data exchange good and staying on the topic of ai, what fascinates you the most about it?
Speaker 1:
like when you first heard about ai, what were your initial thoughts about it?
Speaker 3:
oh, it's fascinating to me right now. It's like it's happening now and it was before. It's fascinating to me right now. It's like it's happening now and it was before. It's like, hey, that's the future. It's like, oh, we watched 20, 30 years ago back to the future. So you don't expect you know, to see, to be, to witness, to be part of that. So to me, the most fascinating is happening now. Every single thing that we're doing now it's involved. So I saw a lot of presentations, very great presentations yesterday's sessions. The majority of PowerPoint slides had some already some graphic production using AI. So it's fascinating. It's here. I think it's here to stay.
Speaker 3:
We also need to be cautious. So the second thing that fascinates me a lot is that AI will not replace human beings. It's going to change the way we work. So I recently posted something in LinkedIn saying like use AI or die your business. Whatever your business is, you need to leverage that or you're going to be left behind. Now how to do that? We're in the early stage. To me is that we have to be very careful with how we handle AI tools, how we trust them, how we train models and, ultimately, how we apply it or deploy it in our day-to-day life. So it's a very exciting time. It's also risky. My two cents advice is like take your time to plan carefully. How are you going to use AI? Be intentional. Always say be you as an organization, what is your purpose, how you see it happening, disregarding what your competition and what anybody else is doing, how you can leverage, but please do not ignore it. That would be my advice.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it's certainly a new technology. I know it's been around for a number of years in one form or another, but it's certainly you know how do we use this new technology and how do we use it responsibly. But I guess, going back a little bit to your career journey, from from where you started to I know you mentioned that you formed your own business Could you just take us a bit through your career journey in a bit more detail? Sure, I'll repeat that just because of the sound, but yeah, thank you yeah um, I'll just start the career journey bit.
Speaker 2:
Um, okay, uh, could you just take us a bit through your career journey, from from where you started to to forming your own business and then everything after that. How did you originally get into the energy industry?
Speaker 3:
Sure, I mean, I was born in Caracas, venezuela oil and gas country that's the main source of business and income in the country. So back in the early 90s when I picked my career as a systems engineer, it was still kind of like wondering how I can connect to that. But everyone's like, oh, we want to work for PDVSA, the national company in Venezuela which was at the very top of NOCs back then. We go through very challenging times, so that's not the subject today, but it's not the same PDVSA. Back then. It was very challenging times, so that's not the subject today, but it's not the same perevesa. Back then. It was very challenging to get involved, very competitive. A lot of international companies as well as the local talent were very competitive, so it was challenging to get in. I was fortunate to get in and start developing software using brilliant data, so Helpdesk and different applications to support the operation. In 2002, I went international and I started focusing more on commercializing software technology and learned a lot, had a lot of success, also failures, and my father was an entrepreneur so I always had that in me and I decided 10 years ago to start my own business. I saw the market completely different and I thought it's like everyone is trying to do everything. My vision for the company was, I mean, when I said everything in our space is data aggregation, storage, visualization, analytics, engineering tools, geostation and so on, I thought that would not be a good formula for the future, looking at how much technology and how much data we were dealing with and how we grow, and now we're going exponentially in that space. So my vision was to be like that to build a company to be that source of trusted sort of source of data, looking at so many powerful analytics engines and engineering tools. Well, it is the key. It's probably not the most funky these days to say we gather that data, we have to use the standards, but it's absolutely critical to make AI work and all those analytics be efficient and useful for our operations. So that was my vision, still our vision, and it's giving us delivery after all these years.
Speaker 3:
We go through hell, too, very hard times sometimes. I mean even after COVID. I mean COVID, we did very well, we got overconfident and we went through challenging times, but we're now reaping the fruit of our efforts. I mean the results and the company has positioned very well as that, you know, like trusted source for data and our vision is just not to only restrict us to do drilling and completion, but also production and expanding the energy sector.
Speaker 3:
Now the role that the energistics and OSDU standards play in what we do are essential. I don't want to exaggerate, but we wouldn't be able to exist without the standards. So that's how important that is for us and that's how I'm so passionate and seeing different generations going through Energistics. I mean bright people that now are retired some of them are no longer with us. It's amazing also seeing the new generation and being that bridge to bring everyone together. I mean it's like if I talk to people you know 10, 15 years younger than me, they have a completely different mindset. They understand AI much better than me, I would dare to say. But also that legacy knowledge and the knowledge that is required now this industry is key. So that's what makes me very passionate about this how we embrace the standards, we contribute and want to make sure that we're always like adding value that space. So at the same time, that has a very positive impact on our company and I also enjoyed, I mean dealing with people, super, learning from them and contributing my two cents.
Speaker 1:
And staying on that track of learning. What are your views on lifelong learning Like? What does it mean for you to continuously learn? You know, maybe it's adopting a new skill, Maybe it's learning from others, Maybe it's both. How important of a role does lifelong learning play in your life?
Speaker 3:
Great question. I am convinced we have to be, especially in this age with AI, learning constantly, and my advice would be like learn the way, the ways more effective for you. For me, for example, I'm a very visual person. I need to interact with people, so coming to events like the osdu and energistics face-to-face meeting are essential you can interact with, see, watch, read. I'm probably not the best at reading and eating books, but some people are my wife is so that's more effective for them. So what I would advise is be honest with yourself. Whether it's like you need to get professional training or two courses, it's definitely very important. Get plugged into the right community and follow your passion. Some people I was also there in that place when you decided your career you say, well, I want to go where I can make more money. My advice is like what is success? Do what makes you happy, happiness. You can make very little money and be extremely happy, and you can be very rich and be very unhappy with what you're doing. It's almost like oh, it's work.
Speaker 3:
A good friend of mine. She's CTO for a major global transportation company Very well known. I'm not going to and I'm impressed. I mean how much money she makes, but she's not in love with the job. She's just very good. She's not in love with the job. She's just very good, but she's not in love with the job. I love what I do, so do what makes you happy, and happiness to me equals success.
Speaker 1:
Do you think as well, there's a lot more longevity, I think as well. Right In terms of if you're doing, as best as you can, more of what you love although obviously it's still work I think you're fueling more of what you love, although obviously it's still work. I think you're fueling more or you're, um, using more of your personality into what you do, that a lot of the time it can feel more uh, you adapt to it more. Right, because work can be stressful at times and it can be quite manic. But if you're passionate about what you do, you can kind of coordinate that balance and sometimes work doesn't feel so much as work, but you know that you're reaching a certain cause, you reach a certain milestone. Maybe you're doing it with people, it's collaborative, but you're part of that community and that can also help with the longevity of what you do.
Speaker 3:
It's a fantastic point. Get around the right people, the people that are going to push you are very competitive, so get around the people that are going to push you are very competitive, so get around the people that are going to make you feel even bad. If you can, as much as you can, take right People have different personalities and it'll be pushed. So, as you're saying, if you're passionate about something, you can extend your longevity in your career and also evolve quickly by being around the right people, getting the right training. I had one of my personal professional targets was Venezuela, and I was very proud of what I the university. I went to Universidad Metropolitana in Venezuela but I also had, you know, a big target in my life, like I want to try what is going to a big deal university, either Stanford or Oxford in the UK or Harvard and God gave me the opportunity in 2013 to take a executive program from Stanford and I can tell you it was, of course, you can tell money wise, expensive, but it was priceless in terms of like 50%, the connections, big deal connections and then the mindset, of course. Then, after those two, I would say, yeah, the knowledge was great. I mean, I did a digital marketing executive program. By the way, it's not now outdated with all the new trends and stuff, but it was very important still today in contact with people. For example, I met people that now work for google or work for intel. So it's that combination and staying passionate about what you do and I can't close this comment with like last night.
Speaker 3:
Yesterday I had a very and I can't close this comment with like last night. Yesterday I had a very active day in the OSDU sessions. Everything was going on very well until the US kicked off operations six hours I mean in the early afternoon here in the UK we had the OSDU dinner, came back to the hotel and I had to work for four hours catching up with operations. I went to bed almost 2 am in the morning. I woke up very pumped this morning because I'm motivated, right. So that's what keeps you going and coming. So that's again my recommendation Get around the right people and really get passionate. That extends and it helps. Be willing to adapt, not to last. Things are moving very quickly exactly that.
Speaker 2:
you kind of touched on it. But the learning doesn't stop. You know, after your university in venezuela, then you went to stanford, but you're still learning now. Some people might say you know, I've got my degree or my qualification, I'm qualified now. I don't need to learn, I need to work now. But part of working and staying on top of what you love and love what you do is to constantly learn, and there's new trends coming up every year, it seems, and you have to keep teaching yourself, keep learning, and I think that's how you stay active and longevity in in what you do, and it's nice to see that there are people that think the same way as well yeah, exactly yeah, and, as you said, I'm still learning every day.
Speaker 3:
I mean, I can tell you, I mean some of those decisions. I can be intimidated by the depth of knowledge and the capacity from people there. That's just learning for me. So it's another piece of advice there. I mean, fear is not bad, it just depends how you handle that. If you feel intimidated, going confront it and learn, that's a very good driver. Right, I'm freezing.
Speaker 2:
Would you say that you had any fears when you started your business? Obviously, that's a big step for a lot of people to make.
Speaker 3:
It's a fear that never goes away, because I have a family that I have to provide for, and business is no mercy, right? So you can be doing very well, sometimes you're going to go very bad or do very badly, although you did your very best. So that fear, though, keeps me coming and, you know, every day is a motivation to say I have to defeat this. I have to do this. So, absolutely, I mean. I thank my dad because he was an entrepreneur and risk taker, and we had several failures in the last 10 years. The company evolved, we started doing something very different consulting and crew dehydration, consulting and different jobs for NOCs in Latin America Ended up going back to the standards on digital space. It's just because that's, I mean, going back to what we said before. That's my true passion. That's who we are right.
Speaker 3:
That fear is going to be there always, but those who have that desire to start something, do it. Just do the right planning. Don't be afraid to do it. That's what I'm going to tell some people. It's like you will never have the perfect plan, but plan carefully what you want to do, take the time and don't deceive yourself. I mean it needs to make sense.
Speaker 2:
Absolutely so. What about for those looking to come into the oil and gas industry now? Either you know they've just graduated or they're looking for a career change. What advice would you give to them?
Speaker 3:
one. I want to stand up for the oil and gas. It's been wrongly demonized, in my opinion, because we all love our environment and, yes, there's been issues, but there are also issues in other energies too. We need a diversified portfolio in energies, we need new energies, we also need oil and gas. So give yourself a chance to get to know the oil and gas industry. It is fascinating the type of challenges we have. It's fascinating how much work companies and people individuals because everything goes down to people how much passion and dedication people put on taking care of human life, security, environment and figure out how you can contribute to that. Again, we need renewables. We also need oil and gas, and the combination of that is what ramps up the future oil and gas, and the combination of that is what ramps up the future.
Speaker 1:
Now, before we wrap things up, is there any other questions that we'd like to get through? Or would you like to present your social feeds? Or is there a website that people can, you know, check out? Linkedin? Can they follow you on?
Speaker 3:
sure, I mean go and find me in LinkedIn. We can share the link later on. Also happy to share, I mean, if people want to know more about energistics here at the energisticsorg website, and of course, I'm happy to talk to entrepreneurs or, you know, even potential, you know clients or operators, service companies that would like to work with us. I mean feel free to reach out. I mean go to our website, badashcom, and also just feel free to reach me out over LinkedIn. So, yeah, happy to share all that and share my experience with people and also learn from you guys. So it's like a mutual benefit when you connect with people. It's brilliant.
Speaker 2:
Well, thank you, pablo, for joining for this episode today. It's been great hearing about you, your career journey, the advice you've given us and your involvement, especially within the Energistics Consortium. So we hope, to our listeners or the Open Comments community, to take a lot from this episode as much as we have. So thank you and until next time, stay safe and keep a lookout for more episodes coming soon.
Speaker 3:
Thank you, oliver, thank you, ash, thank you, it's been a pleasure. Thank you, thank you.