Burmah Oil
BP | |
Headquarters | Glasgow, Scotland |
---|---|
Subsidiaries | Anglo-Persian Oil Company Castrol |
The Burmah Oil Company was a leading British
History
The company was founded in Glasgow in 1886 by David Sime Cargill, an East India merchant, to succeed his Rangoon Oil Company Ltd, also of Glasgow, to further expand and develop oil fields in the Indian subcontinent.[1] On his death in 1904 the ownership and chairmanship passed to his son Sir John Cargill.[2]
In the 1900s, the Admiralty was projecting a changeover from coal to fuel oil for its warships. In 1905, the company signed a contract with the Admiralty to supply naval fuel oil from Rangoon.[1]
In the first decade of the 20th century, Burmah Oil founded
For about a century, the company played a major role in the oil industry, and in the discovery of oil in the Middle East through its significant influence over British Petroleum.
Until 1901, when the
The company was involved in a landmark legal case in 1964,
In 1963, the company left Burma and undertook new exploration in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Australasia, the Americas, Canada and the North Sea until 1986.[8] In 1966, Burmah acquired Castrol renaming it Burmah-Castrol.[9]
The Bank of England came to the rescue of Burmah Oil after the company made large losses on its tanker fleets in 1974. The core of the rescue operation was the provision of a year's grace so that the company could become smaller and more viable.[4] The Bank of England also agreed to guarantee $650 million of the company's foreign currency borrowings.[10]
In 2000, Burmah was acquired by BP Amoco.[11]
References
- ^ a b Dictionary of Scottish Business Biography, published 1986
- ^ A History of the BURMAH OIL Company, 1886 -1924, by T.A.B Corley, published in 1983
- ^ Michael Gasson (Former Group Archivist, BP Archive). "Home: The BP Archive". Business History Links: Business Archives. Association of Business Historians. Archived from the original on 10 February 2007. Retrieved 9 June 2007.
- ^ a b c The coloured history of the Burmah Oil Company Archived 20 July 2008 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "History: Bharat Petroleum". Archived from the original on 8 June 2015. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
- ^ U Kyaw Nyein. "Country Report for Myanmar" (PDF). Ministry of Energy. Archived from the original (PDF) on 1 May 2011. Retrieved 2009-01-20.
- ^ Law of War: Burmah Oil Company v. Lord Advocate
- ^ The Burmah Oil Archive at Warwick University
- ^ British entrepreneurs and brand names
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- ^ BP buys Burmah Castrol BBC News 14 March 2000
Further reading
- A two-volume history of the company was written by T.A.B. Corley: A History of the Burmah Oil Company, 1886–1924 (published 1983) and A History of the Burmah Oil Company. Vol 2, 1924–66 (published 1988).