Infill Thinking Lifting the O&G knowledge curve

After seeing a social media post about another Texas frac sand startup, we were able to contact management to learn a whole lot more about the newest kid on the sand block. Check out our exclusive here… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  …

Our series of takeaways from a week invested in the Permian Basin gathering firsthand intel continues with this update. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new …

About 50 Infill Thinking members came out for our first meet-up of 2019 in Houston in early February. It was a great time. Now we have two more exciting member networking events on the schedule: Permian and Dallas! Login to get the details… There’s a lot more to this story… …

Over the past several days, E&P capex budget news has been categorically negative. Some of the biggest cuts we’ve seen yet have been announced while other E&Ps have cut back their preliminary 2019 spending guidance. Check out the latest budgets and totals we are are tracking here… There’s a lot …

Our team’s week in the Permian Basin is flying by, and our notepad is filling up with boots-on-the-ground research takeaways. Here is our first round of observations from the world’s busiest oilfield… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and …

Talent is shifting. And it’s doing so with implications for value, trends and competitive dynamics. Here are the moves you need to know about… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a …

Every once in a while we “live-blog” earnings conference calls, sharing takeaways and highlighting what matters most seconds after management articulates their points. Today was one such occasion… and there were plenty of fireworks on this one. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  …

Each week we break down the rig count. Everyone can get their hands on the standard Baker Hughes rig count, but no one processes it week in and week out like the team here at Infill Thinking. And since we are spending a full week reporting from the road in …

A couple job openings posted online late last week caught our eye and tipped us off on a new development that may have been occurring under the radar. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, …

2019 E&P capex budget expectations have devolved fairly rapidly, worn down by macro erosion and crude oil price volatility. Over the past several months, multiple Infill Thinking updates have warned that 2019 E&P budgets (which initially pointed to spending increases) were at risk of contracting into negative territory in the …

This is the talk around sand town in February 2019. It is interesting. And it may be too soon to stick a fork in NWS 40/70 just yet… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, …

After hearing some rumblings about changes at Preferred Sands over the past week or two from industry contacts, we were able to contact new management and received a statement about the changes. Specifically, management told us: ….. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  …

Summarizing a leading land contract drillers’ rig count outlook, here are the most salient points from last week’s discussion…. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new …

Last week at the frac sand conference hosted by Petroleum Connection in Houston, we moderated a discussion among four last mile logistics experts. Together, the firms represented on stage touch more than 20 million tons of frac sand per year in various capacities. This panel was a rare chance to …

We heard some chatter about local sand in the Appalachia at the Petroleum Connection’s frac sand conference in Houston last week, so we caught up the plant’s new ownership to learn more about the site and their frac sand ambitions. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see …

While we were traveling gathering market intelligence and meeting with clients this week, some new developments crossed our desk that are worthy of comment. So here are five short stories… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our …

This week in Houston, we attended and participated in the sold-out frac sand and logistics conference. As usual, Pete Cook and his team at Petroleum Connection did a tremendous job organizing this event. As is often the case at these events, some of the  most interesting datapoints we heard sprung …

This week, Covia advanced an argument they have been making on the speaker circuit for several months now, urging customers to use NWS rather than succumbing to the cost savings temptation of local sand. They also introduced a new argument questioning a well performance metric that we’ve never seen challenged before …

This week, a negative revision risk we’ve been highlighting surfaced in the form of a swing from growth to contraction. After digesting, we zoom out to look at US spending trends as a whole. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this …

In our weekly rig count update this week, we digest a 2019 outlook from a leading land drilling contractor. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new …

A couple weeks ago, we broke in with exclusive details on the first ever intra-basin rail movements of locally-mined Permian frac sand. In this post we take the analysis a step further as our prior reporting has triggered exploratory interest from many of our readers. There’s a lot more to …

Check out a top ten list of the latest market intel tidbits we rounded up this week… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill …

Infill Thinking will participate in the Petroleum Connection’s sold-out Frac Sand Industry Update conference in Houston on February 6. Our founder, Joseph Triepke, will moderate the last mile & logistics panel at the event. Here is a preview of what’s on our mind headed into this discussion… There’s a lot more …

The future of a piece of short line track has been jeopardized by the switch to local sand. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to …

Well over 100 Infill Thinking members turned out for our various member meet-ups in 2018, which were enjoyed by all. We are looking forward to seeing you at our events around the oilpatch throughout 2019. Login to get the details on our first gathering of the year… There’s a lot …

Eight quick hits crossed our desk early this week that are too important to ignore but didn’t quite warrant a full post. So here’s eight for the price of one! You’ll find all eight datapoints rounded up in this quick catch-all post below. There’s a lot more to this story… …

What do you expect during frac sand earnings season? Here’s what we expect… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or your membership …

The early-2019 rig count continues to see saw. Are we at inflection or are we not? We discuss… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to …

Construction is in the advanced stages on two new High Roller Sand plants, a story that broke first here back in September. This week, we got the latest scoop on this outfit that keeps rollin’ rollin’ rollin’ rollin’… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full …

Big but not surprising. That’s how we’d characterize the UP’s frac sand news this week. We break it down, providing plenty of Infill Thinking context for reference. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you …

In addition to the in-depth Infill Thinking research updates published this week, 7 quick hits crossed our desk that we believe are worth a mention. So here are some digestible nuggets of market intel. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this …

We’ve said it before, we’ll say it again: Infill Thinking readers are the smartest folks in the industry. Following our exclusive, investigative report earlier this week on draft legislation that could have a profound impact on the Texas last mile logistics marketplace, we heard feedback from quite a few plugged-in …

This morning, Halliburton hosted their 4Q18 earnings call providing commentary on the 2019 outlook and their strategy. We’ve boiled down the hour-long call into these five bullet point takeaways with broader market implications. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update …

Rumblings are growing louder about a potential new Texas law that could carry some weight in how sand travels in Texas’s last mile market (pun intended). In this exclusive report, check out what we’ve learned about the potential legislative change. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see …

Some of the most important numbers of early-2019 are trickling out and we’re tracking them here so you don’t have to. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you …

Last Thursday, Infill Thinking broke the news about a ruling in a key last mile logistics battle after digging through court records to uncover an unsigned order from a judge. Today, other channels are also reporting this news as one of the parties involved has spoken out. There’s a lot more …

In our Friday morning newsletter and a post on Thursday, we previewed this Friday and next Friday’s rig count releases as two of the most important to monitor all year. We noted that the rig count surprisingly hadn’t fallen in reaction to crude prices and pointed out that if it …

Oilfield earnings season is underway. We provide our key takeaways from the first earnings call of the season, boiling down an hour-long call into a 5-minute read of pithy points. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our …

There’s some big news breaking in one of the longest running completions logistics legal battles. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or …

Rig count still matters and we frame thinking about the next couple releases in this update. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, …

Last October, we published research introducing the idea of railing locally-mined West Texas frac sand within the Permian Basin. At the time, we wrote that the concept could gain traction in 2019. It has gained traction. We’ve learned new and exclusive details about the concept’s adoption… log in to read. There’s …

Direct sourcing in the supply chain may feel like it’s been around forever since “everybody’s doing it” now. But it’s actually still very new and the repercussions are still reverberating. In the wake of a flurry of direct sourcing headlines in recent weeks, we thought it’d be interesting to put …

In mid-December, Infill Thinking drew a conclusion based on a sighting of physical evidence we observed in the field. This week, we close the loop on that report with additional photographs (and this time they are conclusive, not speculative). There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the …

The US onshore rig count per Baker Hughes GE was up 2 rigs last week to 1,052 active. What gives? There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are …

They’re coming in so fast that it’s hard to keep up… don’t worry, we’ve got it documented, mapped, broken down, and analyzed for you here. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be …

Today, we extend our coverage of the 2019 oilfield outlook by responding to a question readers have recently asked us about the addressable market for frac sand. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you …

If you pay close attention to the sand and logistics space, then you have probably noticed that lots of specialized firms are press releasing contracts with one particular operator lately. Why? How? What’s next? If you are wondering, you oughta read this. There’s a lot more to this story… Login …

In light of recent contract enforcement news, we constructed this time series on a sand producer’s key customers. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to …

WTI at $42 on Christmas Eve was something that that almost no one expected on Halloween. The chief debate that oilfield suppliers are grappling with in early-January is how macro volatility will impact 2019 E&P capex spending, and as such, jolt the addressable US onshore market. We provide analysis in …

After much hand wringing over the budget exhaustion trend, onshore drilling escaped relatively unscathed into the new year. We discuss that and what’s next… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a …