Pacific Oil : Case Analysis

Becky Price replaced her oil furnace with a propane furnace back in 2006, but the oil furnace’s pipes were still in place. Price canceled her contract for oil refills with High Pointe Oil Company, but there was a problem on November 2007, in which Price’s address was added to the list of oil fill ups and the truck driver filled up the oil pipes with 400 gallons of fuel oil which caused the destruction of Price’s house and her belongings. So, Price sued the company for the failure of not removing the oil furnace’s pipes, including for non-economic damages such as emotions and feelings.

I do not think that Fountaine should have called Meredith for a clearance to add thee clauses. I think they should reevaluate their marketing approach. They should figure out ways to meet the objectives at Pacific Oil. Try to look at obstacle that they would likely encounter. Decide what their minimum acceptable goal to extend the contract. They need to be prepared to set target dates for negotiating and reassessing Relients needs so that meet date can come to a positive conclusion.

The case study on Pacific Oil Company shows from beginning to end the role of power in the outcome of a negotiation. From the beginning, the problem that Pacific Oil Company faced as it reopened negotiations with Reliant Chemical Company was that they did not assert the power necessary to really end up with the outcome of the negotiation they were hoping for. The case study points out several factors that Pacific Oil Company is trying to achieve in the contract negotiations with Reliant Chemical company: the change to a surplus of VCM in the market, the possibility of Pacific Oil needing a supply of their own of VCM to produce their own PVC, and the start-up of several other companies in the production of VCM (Lewiski, n.d.). These

This paper includes information regarding the BP Oil spill. References are listed at the bottom.

Looking at the parties involved in the negotiation, it was clear that each party would have agendas that would be in conflict with each other. For instance, the other ports in the region would like the highest compensation possible while Harborco would like the lowest compensation. Additionally, each party would also have a minimum threshold score that they would need from each outcome before they would support the project. Therefore, it is clear that this is an integrative negotiation which requires joint problem solving to achieve

Valuing MW Acquisition by using APV method assumes in practice that exploiting of all MW’s reserves is certain and happens right after the acquisition. In other words, the APV method excludes the flexibility in future decision making. In this case, Apache has both an option to defer the exploiting of reserves into future and Apache may also choose not to exploit the MW reserves at all.

In late 1990, the group of Amoco Corporation and Apache Corporation had begun talking regarding the possible acquisition of MW Petroleum from Amoco to Apache. MW Petroleum Corporation is a wholly owned subsidiary of Amoco Corporation which has its own reserves, management team and with full ownership in geologic and engineering data. MW Petroleum, a free-standing exploration company that was even as large as some of independent oil companies. It operated exploration and development for well, approximately working interests in 9,500 wells in 300 production areas. The growth of MW was very attractive to the other investors, which company grows 30%

The Pacific Oil Company went into negotiations with Reliant Manufacturing, and its goal was to sign a more long-term agreement prior to the contract ending in three years. Pacific anticipated that the new contract would be signed with no major obstacles or changes, and that the dominant point of negotiation

“VCM is subjected to the process of polymerization, in which smaller molecules of vinyl chloride are chemically bonded together to form larger molecular chains and networks.” Pacific Oil's first major contract with the Reliant Corporation was in 1979. The contract between Pacific Oil and Reliant was a standard one for the industry and due to expire in December of 1982. The contract was negotiated by the purchasing managers in Europe then it was reported to the vice presidents in the states.

In other words, Reliant was a major customer. Perhaps if Pacific Oil focused on increasing their smaller business relationships would prevent them from large losses in negotiating. Then, Pacific Oil's decision to not proceed with manufacturing their own PVC might not have been a very good decision. If the decision was made because it was determine not to be lucrative, maybe all avenues were not addressed, such as outsourcing. This could have given Pacific Oil the power of competition. If they would have proceeded with the manufacturing venture, they would be less dependent on Reliant as a customer. The power advantage would then shift from Reliant to Pacific Oil. Pacific Oil could also approach the various competition to get an advantage over Reliant's threat to take their business somewhere else. Pacific Oil also could have gained some advantage by encouraging Reliant to address all of their issues up front by asking more questions about their concerns (Lewicki, Saunders & Barry, 2011). Finally, conducting all of the negotiations away from Pacific Oil's main office diminished some of their power. Having some higher leadership more engaged in the negotiating process could have diminished some of Reliant's power advantage through perception. Reliant was in a position to demand more

The Standard Oil Company of California(Socal) is trying to determine how much to bid on the Gulf Oil Corporation. George Keller, the CEO of Socal, would need to borrow 14 billion dollars in order to make a substantial bid. While banks are willing to lend the money because of Socal's low to debt ratio, the loan would put the company in a highly leveraged position. In order to alleviate that debt, some of Gulf's assets could be sold. Keller has to consider the value of Gulf's exploration and development program when calculating future returns. Two billion dollars were being spent on the exploration and development program. This money could instead be used to reduce the debt if Socal acquired the company. However, the exploration program

Fontaine and Gaudin started off with a competitive strategy, wherein the outcome of the negotiation was more important than the relationship. This is evidenced by the fact that the market for VCM would be oversupplied in a few years due to the building of new chemical plants and a drop in demand. Pacific only needed to secure an extension from Reliant to enable them to maintain operations for just a while longer or until they could come up with a new business strategy for the future. There is nothing to

The Deontological ethics is marked by steadfastness to universal principles—for example, respect for life, fairness, telling the truth, keeping promises—no matter what the consequences (Halbert, Law & Ethics in the Business Environment. pg. 17).

In the case of POC, POC was aware that the company expected to have a surplus of VCM in the years to come. In an effort to shield itself from having to negotiate a contract with Reliant during an unadvantageous time, it opened the negotiations with Reliant years before the current contract was to expire. Jean Fontaine and Paul Gaudin of POC worked with Frederich Hauptmann and Egon Zinnser from Reliant to negotiation a new contract. Fontaine and Gaudin (F&G) anticipated no major issues with the negotiations and were taken by surprise when

(Lewicki, 2010, p. 585) Fontaine and Gaudin did not prepared to negotiate the full contract. They did not anticipate nor prepare to resolve additional issues. Due to their inexperience, Fontaine and Gaudin were not the correct pairing to conduct the renegotiation, as well, they did not have decision making authority. They had to contact senior level management in order to reach a final agreement. This delay extended the negotiation timeline. Adding to the already stressful situation, the prospect of losing Reliant as a consistent client prosed a potential major issue, especially relating to supply as it would be difficult to identify another client to fill the former demand level. Also, Pacific senior leaders delayed their decision to expand into PVC products, over a year. This delay created uncertainty with the forecast for VCM and derivate products, which had a negative marketing impact for one of the top essential products. Also, contributing to the list of weaknesses, Fontaine’s definition of a successful negotiation differed from the corporate office, in that, he linked a successful negotiation outcome to keeping Reliant as a client by extending the current terms of the contract, solely. However, just as important, Fontaine neglected to take into account all the other potential issues or points of