Week 17 in Review: Ramadan donations, Ithra accolades, and cybersecurity soundness

Aramco’s annual Ramadan Donation Campaign kicked off this week, but a pair of major awards and the signing of agreements to build a cyber-resilient ecosystem proved to be big stories on Aramco LIFE, as well.

‘Without Help’: Donate today to Ramadan campaign

In a tradition stretching back to 2002, Aramco again is calling for employees’ donations during the Holy Month of Ramadan. 

With its “Without Help” employee donations campaign, its looking to join forces with employees (with a 100% match of any donation) to help provide social and medical support to those in desperate need. 

You can donate on the company network at https://myhome.aramco.com.sa/irj/portal/beta/edonation.

Ithra earns accolades at National Culture awards

The King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture (Ithra) received the Ministry of Culture’s 2021 Cultural Institution Award at the National Cultural Awards ceremony held in Riyadh on April 19. 

The award strives to promote cultural institutions, both in the private and not-for-profit sectors, and to recognize them based on their role in serving the cultural sector in Saudi Arabia and their contributions toward achieving the goals of Saudi Vision 2030.

Our crude oil assay: Ensuring decades of quality Arabian oils

For decades, Aramco’s science labs have cut precisely into the deep secrets of Arabian oils.

Unlocking crude oil’s composition secrets is critical information for our customers. It is also fundamental work toward maintaining Aramco’s oil and gas production value chain. Just like each sand grain is different, each crude oil type has its own exclusive chemical and molecular characteristics. 

In addition to customer marketing, crude oil testing maintains the integrity of production and processing points. Under production, hydrocarbons are fickle — one day they may be sweet, and the next day sour with sulfur. Or, they may emulsify, and block the flow in a pipeline.

Promoting a cyber-resilient ecosystem

In its continuous effort to promote a cyber-resilient ecosystem, Aramco has launched a certification for its suppliers that demonstrates their compliance with our cybersecurity standard, which is aligned with industry-best practices.

The company recently signed agreements with nine audit firms in launching its Cybersecurity Compliance Certification (CCC). These nine are the first to join Aramco’s list of authorized audit firms to issue the certification.

These include:

• Bakertilly
• BDO Dr. Mohamed Al-Amri & Co.
• Crowe Saudi Arabia
• Deloitte Saudi Arabia
• Grant Thornton
• KPMG
• Managed Services 
• RSM
• Solutions by STC.

Aramco’s Law organization wins ‘Energy and Resources In-House Team of the Year’

On March 31, Thomson Reuters’ Asian Legal Business (ALB) awarded the Aramco Law organization the Energy and Resources In-House Team of the Year, in its inaugural Middle East Legal Awards event. In addition to winning the major in-house team honor, Aramco’s Initial Public Offering (IPO) was recognized as Deal of the Year for the Equity Market category.

Another award-winning transaction was the project financing for the Petronas-Saudi Aramco JV Companies in the Refinery and Petrochemical Integrated Development project. This project, which involved six export credit agencies, and 23 commercial banks, took about seven years to piece together.