Woodside Petroleum

Woodside Petroleum Limited is an Australian petroleum exploration and production company. Woodside is the largest operator of oil and gas production in Australia and also Australia’s largest independent dedicated oil and gas company. It is a public company listed on the Australian Securities Exchange and has its headquarters in Perth, Western Australia.

History

Woodside was incorporated on 26 July 1954. It was originally named Woodside (Lakes Entrance) Oil Co NL and it was named after the small town of Woodside, Victoria. Woodside's early years were focussed on Victoria's Gippsland Basin. Switching to northern Western Australia in the early 1960s, Woodside joined up with Shell and Burmah Oil to form the original North West Shelf consortium. BHP later replaced Burmah, and with Shell, each became a 40% shareholder in Woodside. In the early 1990s both BHP and Shell agreed to sell down to 34% stakes each, before BHP sold out completely (for an average price of $3 per share, completing the sale in October 1994).