According to local media, which quoted the Petronas CEO, Malaysia’s national energy company Petronas would cut employees in order to secure its long-term viability in the face of growing difficulties in the global operating environment.
“The rationale to do this is to ensure the survival of Petronas in the coming decades. If we don’t do it now, there will be no Petronas in 10 years,” president and chief executive officer Tengku Muhammad Taufik Tengku Aziz told media, according to outlet The Edge, without saying how many jobs might be affected.
In a similar report, state news agency Bernama quoted the CEO as stating that the move was made to guarantee Petronas could “continuously contribute to nation-building” at what it claimed was an editors’ briefing.
According to their website, Petronas employs close to 50,000 people. In an email statement to Reuters, Petronas verified the media claims and stated that the briefing did not specify the number of impacted personnel.
According to Muhammad Taufik, the “right-sizing” process was not the consequence of an agreement on local gas distribution between Petronas and the state government of Sarawak.
The impact on Petronas, a significant contributor to federal finances, and its activities in Sarawak, which controls more than 60% of Malaysia’s gas reserves, was a concern during last year’s negotiations with Sarawak’s Petros.
According to The Edge, Muhammad Taufik predicted that oil and gas development projects would face greater technical difficulties and narrower margins.
According to a government assessment, Malaysia anticipates reduced production of crude oil and natural gas in 2025 due to planned maintenance shutdowns of key production facilities and a slowdown in demand in some export markets.
According to Muhammad Taufik, the company’s earnings share will decrease due to a change in the makeup of production-sharing contracts. He also stated that the company’s existing high margins will eventually drop to low double digits.
He was cited as adding that Petronas must provide other goods in the future, such as blue ammonia, a clean gas made from hydrocarbons, in addition to oil and natural gas.
