S09 ORME 2 2022 Voovio technologies_Layout 1 16/03/2022 08:00 Page 34
Technology
Managing latency and congestion for
improved performance Remote workforces have exacerbated latency, congestion and bandwidth issues.
O SUPPORT THE remote locations of exploration sites and rigs, oil and gas companies have vast Internet networks. The isolated nature of these sites often means that normal Internet connections are impossible. As a consequence, oil and gas companies are often heavily reliant on VSAT (satellite) links that are often plagued with very high delay and limited ability to expand the volume of information that can be shared over the connection. The result? Oil and gas companies frequently suffer from disconnects and performance challenges that cause frustration for employees and project managers. This, in turn, can mean drilling production is slowed, which leads to costly penalty payments. Furthermore, these issues are now being exacerbated by additional congestion on networks caused by employees ‘working-from-anywhere’ and shifting to Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) applications. This can further result in slowed production time and possible financial damage. It is therefore paramount for oil and gas companies to take control of managing latency and congestion in order to maximise performance for their business. But how do oil
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and gas companies go about this? The answer lies in end-to-end visibility, performance measurement, and the acceleration of applications.
The test of remote working In March 2020, oil and gas companies, along with the rest of the world, were forced to completely change the way they operated and communicated. They not only faced some employees operating on rigs or sites in extremely remote locations but also entire workforces working from home, on multiple devices. Systems had to be rapidly implemented to enable communication across all of these varied locations. Companies were forced to quickly embrace collaboration technology to ensure entire remote workforces remained connected.
Oil and gas companies faced frequent network disconnections and outages.”
To overcome the disruptions brought on from having to work remotely from home, oil and gas companies aggressively turned to SaaS applications such as Microsoft 365 and moved to more cloud-based systems. In fact, SaaS technology is expected to account for more than 50% of global cloud services revenue in the energy sector by 2024. As employees were unable to travel to and from rigs and exploration site locations, these solutions became essential for communication and business continuity. Armed with SaaS solutions, dispersed workforces could effectively communicate, keep production lines flowing and remain in contact with coworkers as they adapted to virtual interactions. However, the fully remote workforce exacerbated the latency, congestion and bandwidth issues oil and gas companies were already facing. Massive strain was being placed on network links as an increased number of employees operated on them, using bandwidth-heavy SaaS applications. As a result, oil and gas companies faced frequent network disconnections and outages, leaving users frustrated and the wider business facing detrimental financial damage. For example, one day of downtime caused by unreliable
Image Credit : Adobe Stock
Charbel Khneisser, regional director – technical sales, META at Riverbed, outlines how oil and gas companies can overcome the negative impact of latency and congestion.
