 | |
| Formerly |
|
|---|---|
| Company type |
|
| NYSE: COC (1998–2002)[1] | |
| Industry | Petroleum |
| Predecessor |
|
| Founded | November 25, 1875; 150 years ago (1875-11-25) inOgden, Utah |
| Founder | Isaac Elder Blake |
| Defunct | August 30, 2002 (2002-08-30) (as a company) |
| Fate | Merged withPhillips Petroleum, remaining as a brand |
| Successors |
|
| Headquarters | Westchase, Houston, Texas |
Area served | Worldwide |
| Products | |
| Owner | Phillips 66 Company |
| Website | conoco.com |
Conoco (/ˈkɒnəkoʊ/KON-ə-koh),[2] formerly known asContinental Oil, is an Americanpetroleum brand that is operating under the current ownership of thePhillips 66 Company since 2012 and is headquartered in theWestchase neighborhood of Houston, Texas. The brand is one of the several successors of the originalStandard Oil Company ("oil trust" founded 1870 byJohn D. Rockefeller). Conoco was a subsidiary of Standard Oil from 1884 until 1911 when theSupreme Court of the United States, in ananti-trust legal case,ruled to decouple and break up the monopolized entity of Standard Oil.
AlongsidePhillips 66 and76, it operates as one of the major fuel brands of the Phillips 66 Company.[3] Of those two brands, Conoco has a more dominant presence of gas refueling stations in Colorado, Texas, Montana, Missouri, and Oklahoma in theMidwestern United States, as well as a growing presence inEastern Pennsylvania following taking over the retail contracts of severalGulf Oil locations there, while having a complete absence in states such as California to the west and Florida to the far southeast.[4]
Continental Oil, originally based inOgden, Utah was founded by Isaac Elder Blake in November 1875 as the Continental Oil and Transportation Company and was acquired in 1884 by the increasingly dominant Standard Oil Company. Eighteen years after Standard Oil's federal court-ordered dissolution of 1911,Marland Oil Company (founded in 1921 byE. W. Marland (1874–1941), oilman, businessman and later politician of Pennsylvania and later Oklahoma), would then acquire Continental Oil, moving its headquarters to Marland's home town ofPonca City, Oklahoma, in 1929.
As the Continental-Marland acquisition took effect, Marland Oil favorably phased out its own personal name and rebranded itself into the more nationally known titles of Continental and Conoco nameplates. As it eventually became one of the largest oil companies in the United States, Conoco further expanded its operations globally during the 1970s.[5]
Similar to other oil companies during the1970s energy crisis, initially caused by the 1973–1974Arab oil embargo, Conoco's operations were negatively impacted and so in 1981, Conoco then the ninth-largest American oil company at the time, was embroiled in one of the most expensive corporate takeovers in U.S. history when theMobil Corporation andSeagram attempted to acquire the company. TheDuPont company, ofWilmington, Delaware who was conjured up by Ralph Bailey (the C.E.O. of Conoco at the time) was brought in and hired as a so-called"white knight"[6] and would eventually emerge triumphant defending Conoco from the two vendors (corporate predators).[7] DuPont's acquisition of Conoco at US$1.5 billion, made it the largest merger in U.S. history up to that time, surpassing that of the earlierShell Oil’s acquisition of theBelridge Oil Company at USD$3.5 billion dollars in 1979.[8] Almost two decades later, in 1998, DuPont and Conoco announced their intentions to split which was commenced when DuPont sold 30% of its interest that year and the remaining 70% the following year in July 1999, officiating their corporate separation.
For many years, the company would operate its ownoil refineries, until 2002 when it was merged with thePhillips Petroleum Company to formConocoPhillips. A decade later, ConocoPhillips would then divest its downstream operations that consisted of its gas stations refueling operations under the brands of Conoco, Phillips 66, and 76. The divestiture would eventually commence and the spin-off that contained the downstream operations of ConocoPhillips went under a separate company known as the Phillips 66 Company.[3]
The "Continental Oil and Transportation Company" was founded by Isaac Elder Blake in November 1875.[9][10] Based inOgden, Utah, the company distributed the recently discovered mineral resources of petroleum / oil (first found in August 1859 byEdwin Drake (1819–1880), in a well drilled atOil Creek, nearTitusville, (Crawford County), in the far northwestern corner ofPennsylvania) and its refined by-products ofkerosene,benzene, and other products in the Western United States.[11] Continental Oil Company was acquired byStandard Oil Company in 1884, and was subsequently spun off during theStandard Oil divestiture in 1911.
The main office was later moved toPonca City, Oklahoma, when in 1929,Marland Oil Company (founded by exploration pioneerE. W. Marland) acquired the Continental Oil Company.[10][12] Marland Oil acquired the assets (subject to liabilities) of Continental Oil Company for a consideration of 2,317,266 shares of stock. The merged company took the more recognizable Continental name along with the Conoco brand. However, it adopted Marland's red triangle logo, which it retained until 1970, when the now-familiar capsule logo was adopted.[13][14]
Dan Moran (1888–1948, led company 1928–1947), who succeeded Marland Oil Company founder E. W. Marland as president of Marland Oil in 1928, and subsequently became the first president of the merged Conoco. Moran then ran Conoco for twenty years, seeing the company through economic hardships and challenges of theGreat Depression of the 1930s, and retiring in 1947, the year before he died.[15] The company ran into early trouble when, shortly after acquisition, it was hit by theGreat New York Stock Market Crash of October 1929. Conoco became a key supplier to the United States federal government and its world-wide deployment of theUnited States Armed Forces, along with several otherAllied powers and their militaries during theSecond World War (1939/1941-1945).[16]
Under the leadership of successorLeonard F. McCollum, Conoco grew from a regional petroleum company to a global corporation in the post-war years after World War II of the late 1940s and into the 1950s. Another rough patch for the company came two decades later during the1970s energy crisis, beginning with the 1973–1974Arab oil embargo (resulting from the fourthArab-Israeli conflict of theYom Kippur War of October 1973), from which it did not fully recover until 1981, when Conoco became a subsidiary of former corporate rivalDuPont company ofWilmington, Delaware.[17][18]
In 1981,Dome Petroleum made atender offer for 20% of Conoco. More than 50% of Conoco shares were tendered, evidence that shareholders were unhappy, and several companies made their own tender offers to take over Conoco.[19] Cash rich and wanting to diversify,Seagram Company Ltd. engineered a takeover of Conoco. Although Seagram acquired a 32.2% stake in Conoco, DuPont was brought in as a "white knight" by the oil company and entered the bidding war. Mobil Corporation, the nation's second-largest oil company at the time, also joined the bid, and borrowed $5 billion to bid for Cocono.[20] In the end, Seagram and Mobil lost out in the Conoco bidding war.[21] In exchange for its stake in Conoco Inc, Seagram became a 24.3% owner (almost one-quarter of stock / interest) of the DuPont company.[citation needed] By 1995, Seagram was DuPont's largest single shareholder with four seats on the board of directors.[22]
In 1998, DuPont sold 30% of Conoco,[23] and in 1999, DuPont sold the remaining 70% stake it holds in Conoco Inc.[24] When the independent Conoco went public in October 1998, under a retooled name, Continental Oil Company, it resulted in the largest IPO in history.[25][26] In 2001, Conoco announced it has agreed to buyGulf Canada forC$6.7 billion dollars (Canadian), (equal to $4.3 billion, in the United States currency).[27][28][29] Conoco merged withPhillips Petroleum in 2002 to formConocoPhillips.[30][31]
Before the merger, Conoco had its headquarters in what is now the current ConocoPhillips headquarters in theEnergy Corridor ofHouston; the complex was formerly known as the Conoco Center.[32][33]
The headquarters of Conoco moved to Houston, in 1949.[10] In 1965, the headquarters moved back East toManhattan, in New York City. Seven years later in 1972, the headquarters moved northeast outside New York City to adjacent suburbanStamford, Connecticut; there in Stamford, Conoco occupied space in the three-story High Ridge Park commercial complex, remaining for a decade.[34] In 1982, the DuPont company announced that Conoco's headquarters would move again from Stamford, Connecticut further south down theEast Coast toWilmington, Delaware, where DuPont's headquarters were located since its founding almost 222 years earlier in 1802.[35] The move occurred in 1982.[23] Edward G. Jefferson, the chairperson then of DuPont, said that the headquarters relocation was to bring the head workforces of DuPont and Conoco together. DuPont also announced that it was closing the Conoco offices in Stamford; the lease in the Stamford commercial offices complex was originally scheduled to expire in 1992.[34]
In 1995, Conoco Inc. was awarded a contract by theIslamic Republic of Iran to develop a huge offshore oilfield in the adjacentPersian Gulf to the south. It was the first energy agreement involving Iran and the United States sinceWashington severed diplomatic relations 15 years before withTehran in 1979–1980, during theAmerican Embassy invasion, seizure and occupation there by mobs of student activists and taking U.S. diplomats hostage for a year in theIran hostage crisis. The contract was signed after three years of protracted negotiations.[36] However, the company dropped the plan after theWhite House announced that after further consideration and consultation, that 42nd PresidentBill Clinton (born 1946, served 1993–2001), would issue a directive blocking all such transactions on grounds ofnational security.[37]
The official Conoco historical museum was completed in 2007 and is located inPonca City, Oklahoma, along with the preserved 1914 mansionMarland Grand Home on Grand Avenue, residence of co-founder E. W. (Ernest Whitworth) Marland (1874–1941) and his two wives and adopted children.[38]
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Along with sister brands, Phillips 66, and 76, "Conoco" (/ˈkɒnəkoʊ/),[39] is a major American brand of oil and gas station that has been owned byPhillips 66 since 2012 and was originally the brand used by its originator, Conoco Inc., from 1875 to its merger with Phillips Petroleum in 2002. Although the Conoco brand can be used in any state in which the Phillips 66 Company operates, it is very rare to see the Conoco brand in California and Oregon where the 76 brand predominates.[40][41]
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) Conoco Inc. February 19, 1997. Retrieved on January 16, 2010.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) Conoco Inc. November 1, 1996. Retrieved on January 17, 2010.
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