Open Sources & ServicesUsed By a Fortune 500 Sleuth

Mark L. Robinson

Senior CI Analyst

Mobil Corp.

Outline• Mobil Business Intelligence at a Glance

• For-Fee Online Services

• Internet– Chat Rooms

• Hard Copy Sources

• Human Intelligence

• Third Party Services• Conclusions

Mobil’s CI Operation

• CI budget $650,000

• Informal network of 35 employees linked via Intranet and Lotus Notes

• Developed culture of sharing information

• Use of in-country experts

• Weekly briefing reports for senior management by geographical regions

The Internet:Is There a Snoop on Your Site?

• What You Get From Working the Web– Use of chat rooms for mentions of a competitor or

its products– Price lists– Customer listings– Market research – Executive biographical profiles– Locations of factories and capacities– Technical reports by company scientists

Hard Copy Sources

• Trade publications– Oil Express– Oil Daily– Platt’s Oilgram News– Oil & Gas Journal

• Tradeshows and conference proceedings

• Financial filings with host country governments

Human Intelligence

• Customers, suppliers, retailers– Shell test-marketing robotic gas pump

• Former employees

• Executive speeches

• Other CI professionals

• Use of Lotus Notes to store rumors, interviews, intelligence, and knowledge

Third Party Services

• FIND/SVP– $5,000 yearly retainer

• Washington Researchers

• Oxford Analytica– conference calls

• Burrelle’s news clips and broadcast TV monitoring

Other Services

• Translations– prefer in-country employees versus translation

companies– academics

• Satellite imagery– prefer in-country personnel using digital

cameras and email

Conclusions and Take-a-ways• Open source information

– here to stay and will proliferate– becoming easier to gather since many firms use a

Web interface; no longer need to learn a specific command language

– more marketing to business customers and away from professional researchers

– becoming cheaper as more firms charge for document printing rather than fees for locating data

THE END

Mark_L_Robinson@email.mobil.com

Mobil

The Energy To Make A Difference