Shell opens Bangalore technology centre

SHELL has opened a new, custom-built R&D hub in Bangalore, India, which will bring together up to 1,500 technology experts.

Shell Technology Centre Bangalore (STCB) includes offices, laboratories and high-tech innovation and technology demonstration units. Research fields will include liquefied natural gas, subsurface modelling, data analysis, engineering design, bitumen, distillation and enhanced computational research. There will also be a demonstration plant to turn forestry, agricultural and municipal waste into bio-based vehicle fuels.

The centre brings together all of Shell’s R&D staff in Bangalore, who were previously based at various sites around the city. Shell says that this will create better opportunities for multidisciplinary collaboration. STCB experts will also collaborate with external industrial partners, universities and institutes. There are already collaborations planned with the Indian Institutes of Technology in chemistry and catalysis research, and with MIT in advanced computing.

“Collaboration across different disciplines and with other sectors externally is a key enabler of successful innovation. And collaboration is essential to meet our biggest challenge: timely development and deployment of the best and affordable energy solutions, for today and for the future as the world transitions to a low carbon energy system. Our new Bangalore technology hub brings together the right people in a city that buzzes with innovation,” said Shell projects and technology director Harry Brekelmans.

STCB joins Shell’s two other main technology hubs, in the Netherlands and the US. In total, they employ more than 4,000 staff.