Bharat Petroleum partners Accenture for digital sales, distribution platform

Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) has partnered Accenture to digitally transform the sales and distribution network of India's second largest oil and gas company.

"Accenture will use its capabilities in data, artificial intelligence (AI) and cloud technologies to build, design and implement a digital platform, called IRIS," the companies said in a release.

The platform will integrate real-time data from across BPCL's countrywide network, including more than 18,000 fuel retail outlets, 25,000 tank trucks, 75 oil installations and depots, 52 liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) bottling plants and 250 additional industrial and commercial locations, to provide a consolidated view of its extensive operations.

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The IRIS platform will subsequently trigger automated alerts and actions, including rapid response to equipment failures or hazardous situations, it said.

"It will also empower the BPCL workforce of more than 1,00,000 across the country to make faster and more accurate decisions, including preventative maintenance. This can help increase sales at fuel retail outlets by minimising infrastructure downtime and ensuring consistent fuel quality, as well as improve the experience for customers," the release said.

Digital transformation opens up new opportunities for the oil and gas industry. BPCL is looking forward to leveraging technology to unlock tremendous value, sustainable growth, and improved efficiency, the company's director (marketing and refineries) Arun Kumar Singh said.

The digital sales and distribution platform will use BPCL's cloud infrastructure, making it more agile and scalable.

Deployment of IRIS platform will not only bolster BPCL's digital capabilities significantly but also improve customer experience and transform operations at scale, the state-owned company's digital transformation head Rahul Tandon said.

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