By Yuan Dongming & Yuan Luyao, Research Team on “World Class Enterprises with Global Competitiveness”, Enterprise Research Institute, DRC

Research Report, No.41, 2019 (Total 5541) 2019-3-27

Abstract: In comparison with the major international petroleum and petrochemical enterprises, China’s petroleum and petrochemical enterprises, relying on the rapid expansion of the domestic market and the vigorous acquisition of overseas resources, have a high global competitiveness. However, the competitiveness of China’s petroleum and petrochemical enterprises mainly comes from the expansion of “quantity”. Compared with their international counterparts, there is still much room for improvement for China’s petroleum and petrochemical enterprises in terms of enterprise efficiency, risk resistance and comprehensive internationalization level. The main reasons for their being “big but not strong” are that the disadvantages of traditional state-owned enterprises have not been completely eliminated, the quality of oil and gas resources in enterprises is not high, and the management mechanism of enterprises is not without flaws. To promote China’s petroleum and petrochemical enterprises to become first-class in the world, we need to base ourselves on both domestic and international resources and markets, stimulate and enhance the micro vitality of enterprises, deepen the reform of state-owned assets management system and state-owned enterprises, overcome the drawbacks of various systems and mechanisms existing in enterprises, and accelerate the promotion of enterprises’ global competitiveness by relying on “quality” factors such as technology, efficiency, internationalization level and product quality.

Key words: petroleum and petrochemical industry, World Class, big but not strong