The Future of Offshore Connectivity
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
Release Date: 04/16/2025
Taming the Owner Communications Chaos
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
Oil and gas companies are finally confronting the huge communications and stakeholder challenge they face with their asset owners and stakeholders. Production assets such as oil and gas wells almost always have many part owners (land owners, JV partners, interest-holders, trusts, first nations tribes). Managing these hundreds or thousands of parties across tens of thousands of wells is really demanding. These relationships are complex, sensitive and often layered with legacy ownership structures, royalty flows, regulatory demands and reputational risk. This is much more than an operational...
info_outline
Unlocking Capital for Latin America’s Energy Transformation
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
Latin America is entering a period of rapid economic growth, urbanization, and industrial expansion. Unlike North America and Europe, where primary energy demand has been flat for more than a decade, the region’s energy consumption is rising sharply. A young, increasingly urban population is pushing electricity and fuel demand higher, placing new pressure on infrastructure and supply. This demand surge is colliding with a second global shift: the explosive rise of AI and hyperscaler data centers. These digital megaprojects require enormous volumes of power, often sourced from natural gas,...
info_outline
Power Without Surprises
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
Electricity powers nearly everything in oil and gas, from pumps and motors, to compressors and digital systems. But while production engineers obsess over volumes and temperatures, the quality of the electricity driving their systems is often overlooked. Most teams only discover power issues after equipment fails, leading to unplanned downtime and costly repairs. Unfortunately, traditional power quality meters and relay monitors don’t catch the early warning signs. They lack resolution, require manual data pulls, and don’t provide actionable insights. Worse still, the frontline...
info_outline
Navigating The Maze of Global Energy Regulation
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
In all my years of experience in energy, I rarely worked in pure regulatory areas, but regulations loomed large over everything I touched. The energy sector is very highly regulated, and for very good reasons. From environmental standards to carbon pricing, energy companies are held to a high standard and must demonstrate that compliance to operate locally, regionally, and globally. The regulatory landscape is highly dynamic and under constant change. New regulatory frameworks emerging from Europe and the United States will reshape how energy companies, particularly in North America, do...
info_outline
The Safety Copilot
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
In the UK oil and gas sector, the record on major accidents looks encouraging. Serious incidents are very rare, and the industry appears to be operating safely. Beneath the surface, the data tell a different story. One-third of safety inspections fall below the legal standard, and more than half of process-safety professionals are expected to retire within the next decade. At the same time, ageing assets, shrinking budgets, and weaker regulatory oversight are straining existing safety systems. Operators must sustain high safety performance when experience is walking out the door,...
info_outline
How To Misspend $100 Billion Using Excel
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
Unconventional oil and gas is massive. Every year, over $100 billion is poured into steel, sand, and water just in Canada and the US. Yet, most of the planning behind these extraordinary investments still runs on Excel spreadsheets. Spreadsheets were fine in the 90s, but today they struggle to handle the complex interdependencies and real-world constraints of modern tight plays. The hidden cost to the industry is huge. Expensive inefficiencies, wasted capital, and missed opportunities to improve well design and execution. Other industries abandoned spreadsheets long ago when margins got thin,...
info_outline
Smart Metal In Oil and Gas
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
Oil and gas operations rely on heavy machinery and equipment that perform critical tasks, yet most of this equipment remains disconnected from the digital landscape of cloud computing, analytics, and autonomy. This lack of connectivity leaves operators with higher costs, inefficient maintenance, and limited visibility into how their assets are really performing. The traditional approach to equipment design is no longer enough. Operators face pressure to improve efficiency, reduce emissions, and cut costs, but without better data and smarter tools, these goals remain out of reach. The industry...
info_outline
Smarter Scheduling in Oil and Gas
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
Scheduling in oil and gas has long been a weak link. Wells, rigs, frack crews, contractors, and regulators must all line up in precise sequence, but too often the “system” is stitched together with Excel spreadsheets, siloed tools, and a lot of human memory. The result is inefficiencies, costly delays, and endless arguments in daily meetings. That model is no longer good enough. The complexity of modern operations, coupled with volatile markets and new constraints (from labor shortages to tariffs to water management) is making traditional scheduling tools obsolete. Operators that rely on...
info_outline
Harnessing Energy’s Data Deluge
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
The oil and gas industry generates extraordinary amounts of data from millions of sensors, yet only a tiny fraction, at most 8%, is actually used to inform decisions on complex and valuable assets. Decades of building analytics and machine learning solutions have helped, but they’ve also left companies with a patchwork of siloed systems and “industrial gridlock.” The arrival of foundation models in late 2022 introduced the possibility of moving beyond one-off solutions. But generic internet-trained models are not suitable for high-risk industrial environments, where accuracy,...
info_outline
When Water Bites Back: How Oil and Gas Learned to Respect Its Most Overlooked Resource
Digital Innovations in Oil and Gas with Geoffrey Cann
Water is the unsung workhorse of the oil and gas industry. It's instrumental for generating steam, driving b, lubricating drill bits, flooding reservoirs, and separating oil from oil sands. Historically it’s been cheap, plentiful, and overlooked. As climate pressures mount and scarcity becomes real, water is now emerging as one of the industry’s most critical resources. Water isn’t just another utility, like power. It's a highly interconnected system. A quick fix in one unit can cause downstream failures, regulatory breaches, or environmental harm. Unlike power, water can be reused....
info_outlineOffshore oil and gas operations are among the most complex and remote in the world. From harsh weather to limited physical access, these environments demand reliable, high-speed communications to enable modern digital workflows and keep operations running safely and efficiently.
As offshore operations become more autonomous and data-driven, the traditional telecom models fall short. Legacy systems struggle to meet rising demands for bandwidth, low latency, and mobility—especially when platforms are unmanned or vessels are constantly on the move.
Tampnet is addressing this head-on by delivering a mixed-mode communication strategy that combines subsea fiber, private 5G, and satellite (LEO) into one seamless network. Their infrastructure enables everything from robotic inspections and mobile edge compute to AI-driven automation—critical for modernizing offshore energy.
In this episode, I speak with Frode Støldal, Chief Digital Officer and President of the Americas at Tampnet. We explore how a hybrid telecom model is revolutionizing offshore connectivity, driving operational efficiencies, and accelerating digital transformation. From supporting 450+ global platforms to enabling real-time decision-making at the edge, Frode shares a glimpse of the offshore future—one powered by high-speed, intelligent infrastructure.
👤 About the Guest
Frode Støldal is President Americas and Chief Digital Officer at Tampnet, the world’s largest offshore communications network provider. He brings 18+ years of telecom leadership from Telenor and now leads Tampnet’s digital strategy and operations across the Americas. Frode holds an MSc from the Norwegian School of Economics and a Master in Technology Management from MIT/NTNU.
📧 th@capientco.com
🔧 Additional Tools & Resources
🤝 Connect with Me
🎤 Contact for Lectures and Keynotes
I speak regularly on digital transformation, AI, and innovation in energy. Let’s talk about your next event.
⚠️ Disclaimer
The views expressed in this podcast are my own and do not constitute professional advice.