Industry Leaders: An Introduction to Shell
Royal Dutch/Shell Group of Companies is the world's largest oil company, headquartered in London, United Kingdom, formed by the merger of Royal Dutch Petroleum and Britain's Shell. [22]
In 1833, Marcus Samuel decided to expand his business in London. He had already been selling antiques, but decided to take advantage of the popularity of oriental seashells in the interior design trade at the time and try selling them. [18]
In 1834, Marcus Samuel began importing seashells into Britain, laying the foundation for a global import and export business [86]. Many of the goods he sold were brought back by sailors from the distant East. The most popular and fashionable items in the small shop at that time were mother-of-pearl used for buttons and cufflinks, and shells used to decorate jewellery boxes. [87]
In 1870, after the death of Marcus Samuel Sr., the business passed to his two sons, Marcus Jr. and Samuel. To commemorate their father's most successful trading venture, the Samuel brothers decided to name their tankers after different kinds of seashells [87]. In 1873, the Russian Tsar permitted foreign parties to explore for oil in the Caucasus, and Samuel immediately turned to selling Russian oil [71]. On 18 October 1897, the two brothers founded the Shell Transport and Trading Company, specialising in oil products and shipping [87]. In the 1880s, they began an oil export business, commissioning a fleet of ships to carry oil in bulk. [18]
In 1893, Standard Oil began to fight back in an attempt to regain its monopoly position. Relying on his increasingly powerful fleet, ample supplies of Russian oil and a worldwide sales network, Samuel rejected Standard Oil's acquisition approach. [71]
In 1894, the tanker of the Samuel brothers' British Shell company delivered bulk kerosene to central and northern China for the first time, beginning a relationship with China at the turn of the century that started with the humble kerosene lamp. [72]
Royal Dutch Shell operated under a dual-headquarters holding structure, with Dutch capital accounting for 60% and British capital 40%. The company had 14 divisions engaged in oil, natural gas, chemical products, non-ferrous metals, coal and other businesses; among them, its production and sales capacity for petroleum and petrochemical fuels ranked second in the world. [23]
Between 1910 and 1915, the Royal Dutch Shell Group successively found oil and brought it into production in British Borneo, Mexico and Venezuela, while purchasing a number of oilfields in Romania, Russia, Egypt and Trinidad and establishing sales networks. In the Middle East it acquired a 25% stake in the Turkish Petroleum Company (later the Iraq Petroleum Company). During this period the group successively set up Roxana Petroleum Co. and Shell Company of California in the United States. [44]
In 1911, the Rothschild family sold all of its Russian kerosene and oil assets to Royal Dutch Shell in exchange for company shares; after the transaction was completed, the Rothschild family became Royal Dutch Shell's largest shareholder. [73]
In 1915, the group's first refinery in the United States came on stream [44]. In 1919, Royal Dutch Shell fuelled the first transatlantic flight [18]. In 1925, Shell Canada was formed in Canada. In 1928, Mekog was established in the Netherlands, producing nitrogen fertiliser from coke oven gas. [44]
In 1929, the Shell Group took a 23.75% stake in the Iraq Petroleum Company in the Middle East. At the same time, the group's business gradually expanded from upstream oil operations into refining and chemicals, and it built refineries and chemical plants in many countries around the world. In the same year, Shell Chemical Company was established in the United States, producing nitrogen fertiliser from natural gas [44]. Also that year, Shell Chemicals was founded to promote the extraction of chemicals from petroleum. [18]
In 1954, Royal Dutch Petroleum was listed on the New York Stock Exchange. In 1959, the world's largest natural gas field was discovered at Groningen in the Netherlands. [44]
In the 1960s, Royal Dutch Shell began to strengthen its business in the Middle East [18]. In 1962, commercially viable oil was discovered in Oman [44]. In 1964, the company took part in the first seaborne shipments of liquefied natural gas (LNG), from Algeria to Britain [18]. In 1966, the Leman gas field was discovered in the northern North Sea (with Shell holding a 50% stake). In 1969, Shell International Gas was established. [44]
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Royal Dutch Shell began to diversify, particularly into coal, nuclear energy and metals [18]. In 1970, a large oilfield was discovered in the northern North Sea; in the same year, a large offshore gas field was found on Australia's North West Shelf. In 1973, the first large-scale LNG shipments from Brunei to Japan were achieved [44]. In 1974, Shell Coal International Ltd was established. In 1975, Shell International Trading was set up to trade oil with Shell companies and third parties. [44]
In the 1980s, Royal Dutch Shell began to grow through acquisitions [18]. In 1983, LNG shipments from Malaysia to Japan commenced [44]. In 1986, Royal Dutch Shell's use of 3D seismic technology to find new oil sources also became widespread [18]. In 1989, LNG shipping from Australia to Japan also began operating; in the same year, a 1,615-foot-high drilling platform was completed in 1,350 feet of water in the Gulf of Mexico. In 1991, satellite surveying was used to discover a potentially large oil reservoir at a record water depth of 3,100 feet in the region. [44]
In 2005, Royal Dutch Shell carried out a structural reorganisation, unifying Royal Dutch Petroleum and Shell Transport and Trading under Royal Dutch Shell plc. [18]
It is worth noting that the technologies and standards in this field are also continuously developing and improving.
In April 2015, Royal Dutch Shell acquired BG Group for GBP 47 billion (about USD 70 billion). [26]
In 2016, Shell's Stones field started production; in February, it acquired the British oil and gas producer BG Group [18]; in the same year, it established a New Energies business focused on renewables such as solar power. [36]
In October 2017, Shell New Energies acquired NewMotion, a leading European electric-vehicle charging company, becoming the first oil major to move into the new-energy charging sector. [36]
In September 2021, Royal Dutch Shell became the first major oil company to announce production and sales targets for low-emission aviation fuel [28]; on 15 November, it planned to drop "Royal Dutch" from its corporate name, abolish its current dual Anglo-Dutch share structure and move its headquarters from The Hague in the Netherlands to London in Britain [33]; on 25 November, Royal Dutch Shell and NIO announced the signing of a strategic cooperation agreement to work together globally in the field of electric-vehicle energy. [29]
On 12 May 2022, Royal Dutch Shell's subsidiary in Russia (Shell Oil) signed an agreement for the acquisition of 100% of its shares [7]; in July, Royal Dutch Shell signed an agreement with QatarEnergy to obtain a 6.25% stake in the North Field East project in Qatar [30]; in August, it agreed to acquire the German electric-vehicle charging infrastructure company SBRS [31]; in October, it went on to acquire a 9.4% stake in the North Field South project, the second phase of the expansion. [30]
In August 2023, Royal Dutch Shell, Baoshan Iron & Steel, Sinopec and BASF held a ceremony at the Sinopec Tower in Beijing to sign a joint study agreement on a four-party CCUS cooperation project in East China [32]; on 28 December, it reached a five-year crude supply agreement with QatarEnergy to supply Royal Dutch Shell with up to 18 million barrels of crude oil per year. [13]
It is worth noting that the technologies and standards in this field are also continuously developing and improving.
In April 2026, Shell planned to start producing natural gas from the offshore Loran-Manatee gas field in 2027 [101]. On 27 April 2026, Shell issued a statement saying it had reached a definitive agreement to acquire the Canadian energy company ARC Resources Ltd for USD 13.6 billion, a transaction intended to strengthen its oil and gas reserves and production [102]. On 7 May 2026, Shell reported adjusted earnings of USD 6.915 billion for the first quarter of 2026, compared with USD 3.256 billion in the previous quarter. Shell also announced a USD 3 billion share buyback programme for the following three months and raised its dividend by 5% to USD 0.3906 [103]. In May 2026, Shell shareholders overwhelmingly rejected a climate resolution at the annual general meeting, while voting by a large majority to re-elect Chief Executive Officer Wael Sawan and Chairman Andrew Mackenzie [104]. On 6 June it was reported that Shell planned to sell its fuel retail business in France in the third quarter and exit the French fuel retail market. [105]
In the early 1890s, the Samuel brothers, founders of Shell Transport and Trading, had already shipped kerosene into China and built oil depots in Hong Kong, China; Shanghai; Guangzhou; and Xiamen, later cooperating with Royal Dutch Petroleum to run their Far East business. [35]
In 1903, Britain's Shell Transport and the Netherlands' Royal Dutch formally began cooperating and jointly established the Asiatic Petroleum Company. Its business covered the whole of China, with roughly six to seven thousand Chinese employees in the country. [34]
In addition, many other factors need to be taken into account in actual engineering applications.
On 20 June 2022, Shell China and Huatai Securities Co., Ltd. signed a strategic cooperation agreement under which the two sides would cooperate closely in energy transition and low-carbon technologies, helping China to accelerate a win-win of carbon reduction and growth [42]; in November, Shell China and Shanghai Chexiang Technology Industry Co., Ltd. held a strategic cooperation signing ceremony at the "Beyond Space" venue on the Bund. [39]
Moreover, from the perspective of industry development, market demand is also driving technological progress.
Downstream, Renewables and Energy Solutions (R&ES) provides products and services to more than one million commercial customers. It includes Chemicals and Products as well as Marketing, which covers Mobility, a business serving about 33 million retail customers each day at more than 47,000 service stations. Marketing also includes Lubricants, Sectors and Decarbonisation activities. Downstream and R&ES are underpinned by Trading and Supply and are designed to meet customers' evolving energy needs. [79]
In addition, this technology also has broad applications and practices in related fields.
Shell's New Energies business is actively pursuing the development and deployment of hydrogen transport infrastructure in Europe, Canada, the United States and China. New Energies has established a global product development team, and TechWorks supports this function with technical and engineering resources. One of the key breakthroughs of this collaboration is the redesign of the Shell H2 Power Dispenser. [83]
At the same time, the supporting processes and equipment involved are also being continuously optimised and upgraded.
The word "Shell" first appeared in 1891, when it was the trademark for kerosene shipped to the Far East by Marcus Samuel and Company. This small London business had originally dealt mainly in curios, antiques and oriental seashells. In 1901, the first emblem appeared, a mussel shell; in 1904, in order to present the company and brand name visually, the scallop or pecten emblem was introduced. In 1907, when Royal Dutch Petroleum and Shell Transport and Trading merged, the latter's brand name and emblem (Shell and the pecten) became the concise name and logo of the newly formed Royal Dutch Shell Group, and they have remained so ever since. [74]
It is worth noting that the technologies and standards in this field are also continuously developing and improving.
As of 31 December 2023, the company's total share capital stood at USD 188.362 billion, of which shareholders' equity was USD 186.607 billion [77]. Its shareholders are distributed worldwide and include institutional investors, various funds and individual investors. [78]
In addition, many other factors need to be taken into account in actual engineering applications.
In 1959, the Shell Group began to move towards genuine group management by opening service companies in The Hague and London, establishing a "Committee of Managing Directors" at the top level and coordinating its businesses on a regional basis through regional supervision. In the mid-1970s, the Shell Group decided to develop the concept of business organisation in order to ensure coordination among different businesses within the same region and to deal with governments and other bodies in a consistent manner. In early 1996, the Shell Group restructured its operating organisation to better meet customer needs and commercial challenges. By strengthening group management and establishing a strategy of business organisation, the group achieved both economies of scale and protection against blind acquisitions, which served its management and development well. At the same time, the group encouraged individual initiative, and autonomy enabled managers to integrate better into society and respond quickly to new regulations, changing customer needs and any crisis. [70]
The Shell Group had exploration activities in 45 countries and oil production in 28 countries, making it the oil multinational with the most extensive upstream activities worldwide. Global development, that is, geographical diversification, means that a political or economic crisis or change in any one region will not have a major impact on the rest of the group. Shell built a very large global production and sales system. While maintaining existing markets, it actively captured new ones, entering Eastern Europe, Latin America and the Asia-Pacific region, and continuously improved the alignment between production and sales and its market system worldwide. At the same time, the development of advanced technology allowed Shell's abundant oil resources to be optimally allocated, so that the group made rational use of resources while developing globally. [70]
The Shell oil group takes oil development as its core while diversifying into chemicals, coal and non-ferrous metals. Developing core businesses helps build core competitiveness, while a diversification strategy helps improve competitiveness, reduce life-cycle decline and avoid production stagnation caused by seasonality, and also helps improve corporate management capability. This strategy helps avoid seasonal fluctuations and at the same time achieves a good balance between upstream activities (oil exploration and development) and downstream activities (refining, marketing and related chemical products), as well as related shipping, coal and other industries. [70]
In 1989, immediately after the Spanish government lifted the national oil company's monopoly over domestic filling stations, the Shell Group entered this market and built a network of Shell service stations in Spain within just two years. In response to the continuing decline in the profitability of the chemicals industry in recent years, the group successively sold off a number of fine-chemicals divisions. To cope with sudden events, Shell's operating companies around the world also regularly run scenario-based drills for "oil supply disruption" or "contingency" situations. Thanks to such efforts, the group has been able to maintain stable development, responding promptly even when the Gulf War broke out and suffering no major losses. [70]
At the same time, the supporting processes and equipment involved are also being continuously optimised and upgraded.
2026-6 No. 28 on the 2026 Forbes Global 2000 [106] Award
On this basis, industry experts have also carried out a great deal of research and improvement.
In 2021, Royal Dutch Shell announced a new global strategy, "Powering Progress": generating value for shareholders, achieving net-zero emissions, powering lives and respecting nature. [49]
Moreover, from the perspective of industry development, market demand is also driving technological progress.
On 3 February 2025, it was reported that Elon Musk's social media company X had added more well-known brands, including Shell, to its list of defendants, claiming that an advertising industry alliance was illegally boycotting its website. [95]
