Schlumberger Ltd.
SLB 2.18%
is changing its name to SLB, dropping the family name of the brothers who founded the oil-field services company nearly a century ago.
The company said the punchier moniker, which is effective Monday, is meant to embrace its focus on newer energy services, such as clean hydrogen and carbon-capture technology. The rebranding includes a new logo and comes as the company said it would focus on creating and scaling new energy systems such as carbon solutions, hydrogen, geothermal and geoenergy, energy storage and critical minerals.
“It’s simple, it’s bold, it’s still related to our heritage,” Chief Executive
Olivier Le Peuch
said. “We have to find a path to keep this heritage and, at the same time, [it’s] an opportunity to draw a new north for the company.”
Brothers Conrad and Marcel Schlumberger founded the predecessor to the company that would carry their family name in France in 1926, when they created the Société de Prospection Électrique, or the Electric Prospecting Company, according to the company website.
Throughout the 1930s, the company grew rapidly and established international business units bearing the Schlumberger name. In 1940, the company moved its headquarters to Houston, the burgeoning center of the U.S. oil drilling industry.
Over the past century, the company has evolved from its roots doing surface prospecting for the metal-ore mining industry. By the 1960s, its deep-sea drilling equipment was used in the search for sunken vessels and the company began providing high-precision sensors to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
The company has since grown aggressively through acquisitions, cementing its lead as the world’s largest oil-field services company through its 2010 acquisition of Smith International for over $11 billion.
More recently, Schlumberger has expanded into renewable-energy services along with the broader oil-and-gas industry. In 2020, Schlumberger launched a business unit to explore low-carbon and carbon-neutral technologies.
The following year, the company said it wanted to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, with minimal reliance on offsets. The company has since rolled out new offerings to reduce carbon dioxide and methane emissions from oil-and-gas operations.
Earlier this month, Schlumberger announced two partnerships, one meant to introduce sustainable technology into the production process for battery-grade lithium compounds and another to accelerate the industrialization of carbon-capture technology.
Shares of Schlumberger are up more than 68% so far this year, outperforming the S&P 500’s decline of 21% over the same period. Last week, the company posted third-quarter earnings that topped Wall Street expectations on 28% revenue growth from a year ago.
Write to Will Feuer at will.feuer@wsj.com and Benoît Morenne at benoit.morenne@wsj.com
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