Saudi Aramco's Strategies for Sustainable Competitive Advantage

This report critically evaluates Saudi Aramco's marketing strategies, focusing on sustainable competitive advantage, segmentation, and branding within the context of a changing macro environment. It analyzes the company's strategies, including its responses to fluctuations in oil prices and its efforts to diversify through acquisitions and technological innovation. The report identifies and assesses two key growth opportunities for Aramco, emphasizing demographic and physical factors. Furthermore, it links the company's performance to marketing theories such as network theory, planned behavior, institutional theory, and Maslow's hierarchy of needs. The analysis highlights the importance of communication, resource management, and strategic planning in achieving business excellence within the oil and gas industry. The report underscores the need for continuous improvement and adaptation to maintain a competitive edge. This report is a comprehensive analysis contributed by a student on Desklib, a platform offering valuable study tools.

Running head: Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
Assessment B
Name of the student
Course name
Course ID

1Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
Table of Contents
1.0 Introduction..........................................................................................................................3
2.0 Critically evaluate the company’s strategies for sustainable competitive advantage,
segmentation (including targeting and positioning) and branding.............................................3
3.0 Identify and critically assess two opportunities for growth within the organisation’s
MACRO environments..............................................................................................................5
4.0 Links to the marketing theory..............................................................................................7
5.0 Conclusion............................................................................................................................8
Reference list..............................................................................................................................9

2Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
1.0 Introduction
The study will identify the resources and the macro economic analysis for the
company Saudi Aramco in the oil and natural gas industry. Moreover, through the
identification of macro-economic analysis, it will be easy for the study to identify the pros
and cons of the company that they are facing while making a business in the oil and natural
gas. Moreover, through the involvement of strategies it will be highly important for the
company to deal with various kinds of obstacles that the competitors will pose while running
business. However, in order to indulge the economic activities and resource based activities,
it will be useful for the company in the incorporation of sustainable environment within their
working place. The study is important in the sense that through the deep analysis of macro-
economic activities, it is possible to identify the gaps that are being present within the
policies that are not at all helping in the growth of business as per desired.
2.0 Critically evaluate the company’s strategies for sustainable competitive advantage,
segmentation (including targeting and positioning) and branding
The Saudi Aramco Company is mainly dealing with purification of crude oils and
delivering the oil products to the customers as per desired. The company has faced downfall
in the annual revenue in the year 2019 and the amount of revenue has decreased by huge
margin. In the year 2019, within the first quarter, the company had a whooping revenue of
$53 billion and in the year 2018, in the same quarter, the company had earned a whooping
revenue of $43 billion. Also the earnings before income and tax decreased to $92.3 billion in
the year of 2019, compared to around $103.5 billion in the year 2018 (saudiaramco.com,
2019). The company has revealed that in spite of having low price in the overall oil industry,
the company successfully helped in getting better level of revenue that has been mainly from
the oil supplies. Moreover, through the improvement in the customer segmentation, the

3Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
company will be definitely aim in building up better and broader level of customer valuation.
Now in the world of high level of competition, it is highly important for the Saudi Aramco
Company need to identify the gaps in the technologies to be used. It is an important content
of the business strategy that will definitely allow the company to expand their business. The
company has focussed mainly on the quantity and quality of their products while making
delivery to their customers (saudiaramco, 2019). The company has set up daily target of
producing 13.2 million barrels of hydrocarbon oils and about 10 million barrels per day of
crude oils. Now in order to deliver such a huge quantity of oils to the customers it is
important to set up a strong market for the customers.
Signing an agreement to acquire 70% of the stake of SABIC which is one of the top
petrochemicals companies by revenue. This is one of the best strategy that has been taken by
company in positioning them in a better position within the oil industry in the Saudi Arabia.
This is mainly done by the company in order to increase the overall resource making ability
so that the company can easily outsource in order to produce the desired level of the customer
satisfaction. Taking the innovation in the process has led the Saudi Aramco Company to
bring in products in the form of crude-to-chemicals, non-metallic materials manufacturing,
and hydrogen fuels that has definitely increased the position of the company in the market of
oil and gas industries (Morschett et al. 2015). They have brought in diversity within the
resources and also in their products so that they can provide a tough competition to their
competitors.
They have also signed numerous agreements in order to bring an effective business
environment within the Saudi Arabia. They have signed a Memorandum of Understanding
with Baker Hughes a GE company to establish a joint venture facility to produce non-metallic
products for various energy industries and have opened up various venture of income
generation. The main aim of this joint venture will be to produce non-metallic reinforced

4Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
thermoplastic pipes as a first and critical step towards developing such capabilities in Saudi
Arabia so that other associated industries can grow and increase their potentiality. In order to
minimise the operation costs of the company, Saudi Aramco has placed 5,000 kilometres of
non-metallic pipes in whole Saudi Arabia. This has boosted the brand reputation of the
company in the oil and natural gas industry (Noe et al. 2017). They have not only focussed on
the growth of the business but they also focussed on building of reputation and brand
establishment so that they can perform well in the long run in terms of both productivity and
process control so that the revenue base of the company can be increased by huge margin in
the upcoming years.
The Saudi Aramco Company is mainly aimed in increasing the overall resource
channelization by taking strategies of acquiring big firms of Saudi Arabia to deal with the
process of counter attacking the competitors. It is highly important for the company to bring
in high grade of strategies that will definitely increase the revenue base of the company. In
order to deal with better level of merging and acquisition the company will be able to identify
better level of FDI that will bring in high rate of productivity and the FDI is going to improve
the company performances.
3.0 Identify and critically assess two opportunities for growth within the organisation’s
MACRO environments
Determination of macro-economic within organisation environment will definitely
going to help in the development of business. Two important factors in the form of
demographic and physical factors will definitely going to help the organisation in dealing up
with the external benefit that will really help Saudi Aramco to indulge in better level of
productivity. Through the incorporation of better level of strategies, the Saudi Aramco is
making use of the demography. The company has set up many environment friendly pipelines
that has increased the production rate of the company. Now in order to indulge better level of

5Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
strategy level of production, the Saudi Aramco has basically signed MOU with various
companies so that they can produce better amount of production as per the customer demand.
Taking into account the development of geographical location, the company has
initiated the development of better level of production. Demographic facility is mainly going
to indulge the development of resource based activities that will spontaneously increase the
overall revenue of the company. Now in order to identify the growth opportunities within the
company it has been seen that they have diversified the business and have successfully
increased the revenue base of the company. All the agreements that has been signed by the
company will definitely increase the overall brand image of the company. The Saudi Aramco
Company also aimed in increasing the local market resources by investing heavily in those
industries. In order to increase the power of local resource companies by a whooping amount
of $18 billion for the engineering, procurement and construction of the Marjan and Berri
increment programs Saudi Aramco has awarded more than 34 contracts. The company plans
to boost the Marjan and Berri fields’ production capacity by 550,000 barrels per day of
Arabian Crude Oil and 2.5 billion standard cubic feet a day (BSCFD) of gas. Taking these
two strategies, the company has successfully increased their own resource base and resource
channelization. Through the involvement of better level of actions, it has been seen that the
company is mainly aiming to increase the overall production of the company.
In order to reap the benefit of the physical factors, the company has successfully
indulged the best way to channelize the resources and has incorporated development in the
business. Taking into account the resources that are available locally the company has
initiated the best managers to indulge better level of policy that has changed the business
environment within the oil and natural gas industry (Steiss, 2019). Moreover, with the
incorporation of better amount of progress and process for the development of products, the
company has taken the strategy to build many bi-products that will definitely allow them to

6Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
boost up the local market for resources. Through the incorporation of better amount of
resource utilisation opportunities, the company took the initiative to bring in high class of
development resources that will definitely allow the economy to flourish so that companies
like Saudi Aramco can come and invest in the country. Taking into account the development
of business, the Saudi Aramco Company needs to indulge in building in high grade of
environment friendly pipelines that will help the company in dealing with better level of
resource utilisation. Through incorporation of better level of pipeline distribution, the Saudi
Aramco will be aiming to bring in better outsourcing in importing the raw materials. This is
an important thing that will bring in reduction in costs of operations and using the money the
company will be able to invest in other parts of the operation. It is beneficial for the company
to bring in better process for operation in the field of oil industry.
4.0 Links to the marketing theory
Linking the company progress with the available marketing theory will definitely help
in identifying the gaps in the present techniques that has enabled the company in facing some
sorts of problems. Some types of marketing theories that can be linked with the performances
of the chosen company are Network Theory, Planned Behaviour, Institutional Theory and
Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. These four theories will be crucial in the sense that it will
highlight the incorporation of better level of production. Through the incorporation of
network theory, the managers will be able to highlight the gaps in the communication level
and what are the consequences of the gaps in the education and communication. Manager
need to bring in innovative technologies so that the company can increase the rate of output.
Moreover, through the better level of communication, it is highly important for such
companies to bring in high quality of economic activities. Moreover, it is an important
aspects for the companies to understand, the gaps that are being required and the available
resources.

7Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
Network theory will allow the supply chain managers to increase the production of
goods by using the raw materials in an effective manner. Through the incorporation of better
level of communication, it is highly informative for the economy as well as the company will
flourish. Taking into account the planned behaviour it is important for the company to bring a
detailed report of the available gaps in the resources (Trigeorgis & Reuer, 2017). Oil industry
companies are having huge operational costs and it is important to minimise the operational
costs. Better planning will initiate the urge within the company managers to bring in high rate
of resource channelization. Incorporation of high class of resource development techniques,
the company is mainly going to increase the resource distribution in the cost minimisation
process. Now it is highly important to predict the future that will help the company in dealing
with better level of resource utilisation. Use of the network theory, it will be beneficial for the
Saudi Aramco Company to increase the overall retention of employees and will increase the
supply chain to improve the supply of raw materials. It is highly important for the whole
company for bringing in better quality of resources. In order to bring in high quality of
resources it will be important to bring in high quality of resources. It will bring in high
quality of FDI within their activities to deal with better level of revenue collection process. It
is highly important for the development of resources.
Through the identification of needs of the company it will be easy to bring in projects
based on the available resources that will definitely help in developing the brand image of the
company. Now in order to maintain the brand image of the company, it is required to deliver
better amount of quality products to the customers (Steiss, 2019). The company need to
increase the skills and potentiality of the managers and sub-managers to indulge the
development of business. Cost minimisation and production maximisation will increase the
company revenue by huge margin. In order to increase the overall resource development it is
important to take over the traditional method and bring in new level of innovations in the

8Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
business. Moreover, through the better level of economic activities the company will
definitely allow the development of business. However, the business innovations in the form
of better marketing will incur the employees to learn many new techniques.
5.0 Conclusion
The whole study is claiming the fact that in order to develop the business it is highly
important for the company to bring in innovations. Now in order to highlight the level of
business communication, it is highly important to bring in better level of communication.
Through the linking of best theories it has been seen that company need to act more on the
macro economic factors in order to indulge the resource channelization. The company plans
to boost the Marjan and Berri fields’ production capacity by 550,000 barrels per day of
Arabian Crude Oil and 2.5 billion standard cubic feet a day (BSCFD) of gas.

9Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
Reference list
Bettis, R., Gambardella, A., Helfat, C., & Mitchell, W. (2014). Quantitative empirical
analysis in strategic management. Strategic Management Journal, 35(7), 949-953.
Certo, S. T., Busenbark, J. R., Woo, H. S., & Semadeni, M. (2016). Sample selection bias and
Heckman models in strategic management research. Strategic Management Journal,
37(13), 2639-2657.
Ginter, P. M., Duncan, W. J., & Swayne, L. E. (2018). The strategic management of health
care organizations. John Wiley & Sons.
Lasserre, P. (2017). Global strategic management. Macmillan International Higher Education.
Morschett, D., Schramm-Klein, H., & Zentes, J. (2015). Strategic international management
(pp. 978-3658078836). Springer.
Noe, R. A., Hollenbeck, J. R., Gerhart, B., & Wright, P. M. (2017). Human resource
management: Gaining a competitive advantage. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill
Education.
saudiaramco. (2019). Saudi Aramco and Baker Hughes sign MOU for non-metallic materials
production facility in Saudi Arabia. Retrieved 12 August 2019, from
https://www.saudiaramco.com/en/news-media/news/2019/aramco-mou-baker-hughes-
non-metallic-materials-production-facility
saudiaramco.com. (2019). Saudi Aramco awards contracts valued at $18 billion to increase
Marjan and Berri oilfields’ production capacity. Retrieved 12 August 2019, from
https://www.saudiaramco.com/en/news-media/news/2019/aramco-contracts-marjan-
berri-oilfields

10Building and Marketing High Performing Organisation
Simon, D., Fischbach, K., & Schoder, D. (2014). Enterprise architecture management and its
role in corporate strategic management. Information Systems and e-Business
Management, 12(1), 5-42.
Steiss, A. W. (2019). Strategic management for public and nonprofit organizations.
Routledge.
Trigeorgis, L., & Reuer, J. J. (2017). Real options theory in strategic management. Strategic
Management Journal, 38(1), 42-63.