The land industry is cyclical—which is not news to anyone reading this.  In many ways, the new year will pretty much pick up where 2013 left off.  On the other hand, I’m seeing some nice movement back to good old fashioned conventional landwork.

 

Glut of Net Acreage

The shale plays of the last few years are not over by any stretch, but we all know that the fanatical buy-any-net-acreage-you-can is largely behind us (but not dead).  

 

After years of accumulating lease acreage, 2013 saw a transition in focus from accumulation to exploitation.  In other words, companies generally slowed down on the acquisition of additional leasehold and turned their attention to deciding what they wanted to drill themselves, and selling the rest.  

 

For the drilling portion, there is all of the great work related to drill-prep—abstracts, title opinions, curative and ‘filling in holes’ in the leasehold.  On the A&D side, landmen are seeing lots of due diligence work related to Acquisitions and Divestitures.  I expect 2014 to be similar with regard to the shale plays.

 

From a the Landman Technology perspective, managing title instruments in an efficient and productive manner is vital.  No new technology needed here, as anything as simple as a scanner, jump drive and email account could suffice.  We at TotaLand have seen an enormous shift by our users toward title management and abstracting functionality.

 

Return of Conventional and 3D Seismic

We have seen a welcome return to conventional leasing and drilling, and since not much is drilled without seismic data anymore, we are seeing a resurgence of interest in 3D seismic, with some large projects getting underway.  I can tell you from years of experience both as a former field guy and with clients using TotaLand for seismic, it is foolish to attempt such a project without some sort of technical system in place.  Between tracking and signing up both mineral and surface interests, keeping up with the multi-faceted GIS needs, as well as managing all of the surface restrictions and hazards, even a modest-sized project can be overwhelming without the right system.  Since I spent a great deal of time in the field working on various seismic shoots in various capacities, TotaLand naturally reflects that experience and can be an invaluable tool for your next project.

 

Pipeline and Other Surface Work

We are also seeing a significant uptick in pipeline and other surface work.  Drill pads, access roads, flowlines and trunklines, all being negotiated and set up at a brisk pace.  Surface work is in many ways less complicated than mineral work, but it is generally more GIS-intensive and requires conscientious management of surface restrictions and damage payments.  Again, technology (or the lack thereof) will have a tremendous impact on success or failure.

 

Splintering

Here I refer to the phenomenon of new brokerages popping up as the larger brokerages scale back from the shale play posture.  We have seen quite a bit of that in the last 12 months as very capable brokerage project managers either go on to in-house work or go out on their own, particularly working on the aforementioned drill-prep and A&D projects.  TotaLand is able to provide these new brokerages with everything they need from broker billing to title management to GIS support and more, all at an affordable monthly price and with the peace of mind of SSA16 compliance.

 

So the more things change, the more they stay the same.  Technology continues to be the landman’s friend and that promises to be even more true as we face another exciting year.  Here’s to wishing that 2014 is everyone’s best year ever.  Please do not hesitate to give us a call if we can be of any help.

Bill Justice - Founder/President, TotaLand Technologies