How they do it at BP Amoco

BP's modern structure was brokered by Winston Churchill to ensure a supply of bunker fuel for the Royal Navy. Since then it has often boldly sailed where few have gone before. It was one of the first big privatizations initiated by the Thatcher government in the 1980s and, bar a bit of a blip in the early 1990s, has hardly looked back since. Last year it took a further voyage into the unknown when it embarked on the largest industrial merger in history with Amoco, building a $150 bn giant