About Our Speaker(s)
Dr. Mark Bentley
Mark Bentley obtained a PhD in Structural Geology at the University of Wales, and then joined Shell, working initially as a petroleum engineer and subsequently production geologist in the UK, Oman and the Netherlands. He then joined TRACS where he worked for 24 years as a consultant and course tutor, eventually leading the training business up until 2022. He now works independently as Langdale Geoscience and also holds a part time position as Associate Professor at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh.
He has worked on fields in many of the major petroleum basins of the world, is a highly active course tutor and course designer and has run training courses on every continent (except Antarctica, but still hopes to go there one day). His primary technical expertise is reservoir modelling and his current interest is in the adaption of reservoir modelling techniques to the new challenges of the energy transition.
Mark has served as a Distinguished Lecturer for the SPE and the EAGE, has made numerous conference presentations and publications in the field of reservoir modelling and uncertainty-handling and is co-author with Phil Ringrose of the reference text ‘Reservoir Model Design’.
Diana Abdul Rahman
Diana is currently the Senior Manager for Reservoir Management & Development, at ExxonMobil KL Technology Center. Diana graduated from Colorado School of Mines, USA with a Degree in Geological Engineering.
Diana joined ExxonMobil in 2002 as a Geoscientist in Upstream Malaysia’s EMEPMI, and held a variety of technical assignments, working Malay Basin oil and gas fields with a stint in Reservoir Modeling. In 2010, Diana moved to Houston working in EM Production Company on Zafiro Field, Equatorial Guinea. In 2012 she moved to EM Development Company, planning wells and building models for Arkutun Dagi field development in Sakhalin. In late 2014, Diana moved back to KL as Geoscience Technical Team Lead for EMEPMI, followed by assignments in Commercial and Opportunity Portfolio Coordination. Diana joined EM KL Technology Center in 2020 as a Geoscience Advisor and in 2021 moved into her current role as Senior Manager – Reservoir Development & Management; leading a team of Reservoir Engineers & Geoscientists providing integrated subsurface support to global ExxonMobil assets across both Upstream and Low Carbon Solutions.
Matthew Ellwood
Matthew Ellwood is a Geoscientist who specialises in the field of reservoir modeling. He obtained degrees in Geology (hons) and Commerce at the University of Western Australia. He has honed his knowledge in this domain with a variety of technical roles across 14 years within SLB in Australia, the UK and Norway. Today he is responsible for leading the technology direction within the domains of structural and reservoir modeling. Alongside this team, he is developing several of the preeminent digital solutions adopted by the Energy industry today with many under the banner of the Petrel™ subsurface software. This team is highly engaged in leading the digital transformation of the Energy industry, addressing the ever-evolving needs of our community to solve reservoir challenges.
Hijreen Ismail
Hijreen Ismail's journey in the oil and gas industry spans over 18 years. She is technically qualified as Principal in reservoir geophysics at PETRONAS. Currently, she excels in her dual roles as a senior manager and technical professional. Hijreen's leadership in managing various FDP teams has sharpened her expertise across multiple facets of the industry, from geoscience to techno-commercial analysis.
Satyashis Sanyal
Reservoir geologist and expert geomodeler, with more than 22 years’ experience of working with multi-national operators in offshore and onshore oil and gas fields, for a wide variety of depositional environments. Currently working as a Principal Reservoir Geologist in PETRONAS Carigali with the role of Technical Authority (Reservoir Geology) for several Malaysia domestic as well as international assets, for both operated and non-operated blocks. His technical expertise lies in review and quality control of reservoir models, mature and greenfield development plans, preparation of technical guidelines and complex uncertainty workflows, providing classroom trainings and leading multi-disciplinary integration for reservoir characterization and modeling studies. He is passionate about coaching and mentoring young reservoir geoscientists and holds a Master’s degree in Applied Geology from IIT Roorkee, India. His other interests include astronomy and paleo-anthropology.
Shahbaz Sikandar
Shahbaz has over 25 years of global subsurface experience, having worked in various countries in technical and management positions with Schlumberger, Centrica Energy, Maersk Oil and Qatar Energy. He has successfully worked on maximising economic value from existing assets and global growth projects spanning all phases of upstream activities, from exploration and appraisal to green and brownfield developments. Primarily a reservoir engineer, he has developed solutions over the years to address field development and performance challenges and is a keen advocate of employing decision quality principles to arrive at optimal technical solutions.
Dr. Heiko Hillgartner
Dr. Heiko Hillgartner is currently the Geology Advisor in Sarawak Shell Berhad. He is an Integrated Reservoir Modelling SME with 26 years' experience in the industry as a technical professional and expert in hydrocarbon maturation, reservoir modeling, and carbonate reservoirs with focus on the Middle East, Central Asia, West Africa and now South-East Asia.
Dr. Upendra Tiwari
Dr. Upendra Tiwari is a highly accomplished geophysicist with over two decades of industry expertise, having worked with leading companies such as ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, Saudi Aramco, and now with PETRONAS. His extensive experience spans both conventional and unconventional global E&P projects. Holding a Ph.D. from the University of Texas, Dr. Tiwari’s expertise covers advanced time-lapse seismic (4D), reservoir characterization, and the application of data analytics to tackle complex geoscience and engineering problems. An award-winning contributor, he has received best paper honors at SEG, EAGE, and AAPG/SEG events and holds two patents in AI/ML applications for subsurface and surface solutions. Dr. Tiwari’s prolific publishing record includes over 20 technical papers, and his leadership is evident through his role as chair and technical committee member in numerous international conferences and workshops, reinforcing his status as a thought leader in the field.
Dr. Daren Shields
Daren is reservoir geologist working with PETRONAS Carigali since 2015. He has a deep interest in reservoir characterization, sedimentology, seismic methods, and algorithm development and is passionate about using these tools to increase the predictive capability of reservoir models. Daren has 15 years of international experience and holds a PhD in geology from the University of Queensland.
David Marquez
Over 25 years of experience as a Geoscientist in the Oil & Gas industry, with a long-standing expertise on the development and commercialization of software solutions for reservoir characterization problems, including 3D reservoir modelling, stochastic seismic inversion, statistical rock physics as well as decision-making under uncertainty. I have worked in many different projects for integrated reservoir characterization, with multidisciplinary teams composed of geologists, geophysicists, petrophysicists and reservoir engineers. Since 2018, I am the Global Product Champion for Reservoir Modeling in Schlumberger.