Argus Global Base Oils Conference

In her 33 years at Chevron, Alicia Logan's innovative thinking has built a trail of successes. She grew its convenience store franchise in the west to 800 locations while managing a district with more than 900 petrol stations including Los Angeles, the largest gasoline market in the United States. Under her leadership, Chevron's base oil business has been tackling the dual challenges confronting the industry -- higher performance and lower carbon solutions throughout the value chain. Her first year coincided with the pandemic. By improving agility in the supply chain, Chevron delivered value to lubricant blenders. Logan also turbocharged Chevron's entry to Group III/III+ capacity with the acquisition and integration of the NEXBASE portfolio. Once onboarded she prioritized expanding Group III production to meet evolving specifications and to ensure Chevron offers the right products and services that will deliver the maximum value to customers. Read less

Ken has over 30 years of experience in the lubricant industry and holds a PhD. In Physical Chemistry from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Currently, he is the Global PAO Technical Services Manager with Chevron Phillips Chemical. Prior to this, he was a Research Fellow and Team Leader for NAO and PAO Research and Technology responsible for the product development, process improvement and technical service for NAO and PAO product lines. Ken is the currently the immediate Past-President of STLE. He served on the Board of Directors of STLE from 2006 – 2017, STLE’s Treasurer, Secretary, Vice-President and President (2021-2022). He holds a CLS (Certified Lubrication Specialist) and has served on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Lubrication Science and as a Technical Editor for Tribology & Lubrication Technology. He has also presented over 70 technical papers at STLE, NLGI, AICHE, ELGI, UNITI, ACS and SAE meetings and holds 21 US patents. Read less

Michel (BSc-Chemistry ) has 32 years experience in Lubricant additives, formulations and feedstock base oil manufacturing. Prior to working for CPChem ,Michel worked for Lubricant & fuel Additives as Quality Control Group Leader at Ethyl SA Research & Technical support Rep. for Chemical Intermediates (including Alcohols, Linear Alpha olefins & Polybutenes) at Amoco Chemical Belgium R&D center (Louvain La Neuve, Belgium), TS&D Representative for Linear Alpha olefins & Polyalphaolefins at BP Belgium and later as Market development manager for Ineos Oligomers. Author or co-author of various papers and patents, he is currently Polyalphaolefins Business dev Manager EMEA for Chevron Phillips Chemical. Read less

Charlotte is heading the team responsible for sourcing, procuring, researching, and innovating lubrication solutions for the Maersk fleet. A key focus for her is to support the decarbonization of the Maersk fleet by collaborating closely with lubricant industry players and, not least, by looking differently at lubrication. After a few years in the retail industry, Charlotte joined Maersk in 2007 where she has held various roles within lubricant procurement. She holds an MSc in business administration from CBS. Read less

Analysing and forecasting the impact of macro / microeconomic trends on a broad range of asset classes, where necessary challenging market psychology and consensus views. The joy of working as a market economist is a constant need to research and learn about the changing landscape of the way that the world works, well beyond the limited scope of economics and financial markets. The desire is to enable and facilitate critical & lateral thinking perspectives on global economic, political and asset market trends; to convey these ideas enthusiastically in terms that are accessible and thought provoking. Having spent much of his childhood in Libya and Iran, Marc has a particular interest in the Middle East, is passionate about music of all genres, and a regular guest on TV & Radio, and widely quoted in the media. Read less

Mark is approaching 40 years in the lubricant industry. Mark is the founder and CEO of Aztec Oils Ltd, an independent lubricant blender based in the UK and established in 1995, supplying Automotive and Industrial lubricants through a worldwide distribution chain. Read less

Dennis Eijdenberg is Technical Support Manager at Axel Christiernsson, the world’s largest private label lubricating greases manufacturer. Within this role he is the linkpin between the technical, development and commercial side of grease-manufacturing and -application. Dennis has a focus on sharing knowledge, and finding practical solutions for technical challenges and inquiries. Recently he has successfully led the attribution of the EU Ecolabel to the Dutch Axel grease manufacturing site, and has been certified as Certified Lubrication Specialist by STLE. He is currently involved in the field testing of several extreme heavy duty EALs (Environmentally Acceptable Lubricants), as well as supporting the lithium transition at Axel Christiernsson and its customers Read less

Since 2014 David has managed the UKLA’s operations in Europe providing effective management, leadership and development of UKLA’s Secretariat team; he is constantly developing and maximising membership of the UKLA; delivering quality focused membership services and ensuring efficient, effective management and administration of the organisation. David is also currently the Company Secretary for the Verification of Lubricant Specifications (VLS, a subsidiary of the UKLA). David is an established and experienced senior leader with extensive experience within a variety of association, membership and public sector, not for profit charitable organisations (ExxonMobil and Chartered Institute of Educational Assessors), operating in challenging, fast-moving politically sensitive and regulated environments at board level including leading organisations in senior roles involving defining and setting industry standards, working in partnership with government on programmes of change, and partnering with key industry stakeholders on lobbying and influencing the policy agenda of the day. Read less

After gaining his Bachelor's and Master's degrees in CS Engineering from Warwick University, UK, Siddharth then went and gained his MBA from IIM in Bangalore, India. Further, he pursued a strategic marketing programme from the University of Michigan, US. Using his education experience, Siddharth drove the technology changes within the family business and focused on corporate culture within the group upgrading the same to the level of being one of the great lubricant and grease companies worldwide. The group is known for its dedication and attention to detail which has brought the world's greatest brands to their doors and they can boast customers such as Castrol, Shell, Mobil, Valvoline, Fuchs, Indian Oil, as well as Timken and SKF to name but a few. With four plants in India the family looked to expand abroad and under Siddharth's leadership the group built and commissioned their new plant in the UAE, a technological state-of-the-art lubricant and grease plant on the inner harbour of the Hamriyah Free Zone. This is the first of its kind in the region, being a fully automated, PLC controlled grease and lubricant plant run on ABB technology. Read less

Mathew Cole-Evans is responsible for engaging with European passenger car OEMs to understand their engine oil specifications & requirements and managing Lubrizol’s engine oil OEM product approvals. Mat has been with Lubrizol for seven years, originally joining the Mechanical Testing department and developing Lubrizol’s EV testing capabilities. Prior to joining Lubrizol, Mat worked in Engine Design and Development. Mat is a Chartered Engineer with IMechE and graduated from Loughborough University in 2014 with a Masters degree in Automotive Engineering. Read less

Jayanta is an accomplished leader with close to 3 decades of leadership experience in Supply Chain across multiple functions – Planning, Procurement, Manufacturing, Customer Fulfilment and Business Process Implementation – in Asia Pacific, India, ME, KSA and now currently in Global businesses. Jayanta has progressed through roles of increasing responsibility in Supply Chain and is currently based out of the HQ of Castrol business in the UK as the Global Base Oil Procurement Director. Prior to moving to the UK, he was in the Board of Castrol India Limited as an Executive Director (Supply Chain). Jayanta has a diverse international experience in leading teams and operations across geographies and brings in end-to-end supply chain leadership and insight - from strategy development till implementation - across the value chain – from procurement to manufacturing and customer service - through building of strong processes, teams, and systems. Read less

Joris van der List is educated as a Mechanical Engineer (MSc) at the University of Twente in the Netherlands. Joris has over 20 years of experience in the lubricants industry with a strong background in product development and innovation management. Joris started at Q8Research/KPR&T as a research scientist responsible for the development/formulations of lubricants and is currently Technology Manager at Q8Oils, head of the technology department. leading a team of product line managers and sales engineers. Joris is responsible for the global management of the energy, MWF, automotive, and general industry lubricants. On top of this, Joris is the dedicated global lead within Q8Oils on sustainability and a member of the UEIL Sustainability Committee and leads the UEIL Sustainability Downstream workgroup. Also member of the board of the VSN, the Dutch Lubricants Association. Read less

Gabriella is the global editor of Argus' Base Oils publication, leading the global editorial team and publishing the weekly report. She previously worked as a reporter in IHS Markit’s Maritime & Trade department covering all areas of shipping. And prior to that worked for several years at a ship management company in the Safety Security and Environment department. Read less

John Dietrich is the base oil reporter for the Americas at Argus. He has covered the base oil market for the past two years and has covered commodity markets for 12 years. John is a product of the University of Missouri’s journalism school and is based in Houston, Texas. Read less

Guo Harn graduated from the National University of Singapore with First Class Honours in Economics. He was on the university’s Dean List in 2014/2015 and 2016/2017. Guo Harn also holds a diploma with highest distinction in Business Information Technology from Temasek Polytechnic. He was on the institute’s Director’s Honour’s List in 2009 and 2010. Read less

Irina is a Senior Manager Consulting in the London office of Argus. She is responsible for the bespoke consulting work in the crude and refined products segment, including specialty products, with a focus on Europe and Africa. Irina has over 9 years’ experience in the oil and gas industry. Prior to Argus, Irina was heading the European gas events portfolio of Fleming Group. Irina has an MSc in Energy, Trade & Finance from Cass Business School and wrote her master’s thesis together with Gazprom Marketing & Trading on small-scale LNG. Read less

Catherine is responsible for coordinating Argus’ business development strategy for base oils, marine fuels and bitumen. For base oils, her role involves engaging with market participants to explain the benefits of using Argus base oil spot prices to facilitate risk management. From London, she works closely with the global editorial team to develop awareness and understanding of Argus Base Oils in global markets. Prior to her current role, Catherine was responsible for European base oils market coverage at Argus: contributing spot prices, market commentary and analysis to Argus’ weekly global base oils report. Catherine holds an MSc in Petroleum Geoscience from the University of Aberdeen and a BA in Natural Sciences from Trinity College Dublin. Read less

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