Xecta and Santos launch digital oilfield project in Australia and PNG
Xecta, a Houston-based energy technology company, announced a partnership with Australian energy producer Santos to deploy its Integrated Production System Model (IPSM) across a broader portfolio of Santos’s assets. The five-year agreement will expand on a successful pilot in the Cooper Basin and extend the rollout to cover Santos’s Coal Seam Gas operations in Eastern Australia and oil and gas assets in Papua New Guinea.
The IPSM is designed to provide full, real-time visibility of oil and gas production systems—from the reservoir through to the facility inlet. Unlike traditional tools that only address isolated segments of the production process, IPSM continuously analyses billions of telemetry data points and automates complex engineering tasks. This integrated approach allows operators to optimise performance across the entire production chain, with minimal manual intervention.
Santos first implemented the IPSM in the Cooper Basin, where it was used across more than 1,000 wells and ten satellite facilities. The pilot led to a significant increase in production efficiency, earning Santos an upstream innovation award at the 2024 Platts Global Energy Awards. Xecta was also shortlisted for Commercial Technology of the Year, highlighting the platform’s impact and scalability.
With the technology proven in the field, the two companies are now expanding the project to include Santos’s extensive Coal Seam Gas assets, as well as complex operations in Papua New Guinea. These new deployments are expected to streamline production workflows, reduce engineering workload, and maximise asset performance under challenging geological and operational conditions.
Xecta’s CEO, Sanjay Paranji, described IPSM as a transformational step for the oil and gas sector. “This system represents a fundamental shift in how production systems are understood and optimised,” Paranji said. “By combining physics-based modelling with AI, IPSM automates surveillance, highlights optimisation opportunities, and dramatically reduces manual effort—even in the most complex fields.”
The platform’s hybrid intelligence model enables it to operate across a wide range of production environments, continuously recalibrating based on live data. This ensures that performance insights remain accurate and actionable, even as field conditions evolve.
The expanded deployment marks a significant milestone for both companies. For Santos, it reinforces a commitment to digital transformation and operational excellence. For Xecta, it positions IPSM as a leading-edge solution for intelligent oilfield management on a global scale.
As the energy sector increasingly turns to automation and digital solutions, projects like this set a new benchmark for efficiency, reliability, and data-driven decision making. The Santos-Xecta partnership not only signals progress in digital oilfield management but also offers a model for how producers can future-proof operations in an era of rising complexity and sustainability demands.
