By Stephanie Kelly
July 30 (Reuters) – BP plans to cut about 700 of its non-frontline global workforce, according to an internal email seen by Reuters, as the oil major sharpens its operational focus to bolster profits and returns.
The reductions would impact around 8% of the 8,500 non-frontline roles that historically were part of the company’s production and operations business, the email showed. Frontline roles include operators, technicians and maintenance roles, and BP said in the email it did not expect any material change to those teams.
“If your role is affected, that could mean that it does not exist in the new organization, changes materially, or moves into a different part of the organization,” the email said.
BP has been intensifying efforts to simplify its operations in a bid to reduce debt, boost profit and refocus on its oil and gas businesses, after scaling back its investment in renewable energy. Since CEO Meg O’Neill took over in April, BP reorganised into two business segments — upstream and downstream — from three and the new structure went into effect at the start of this month.
As of 2025, BP had 93,700 employees and operated across 61 countries, according to its annual report.
“We are building a simpler, stronger, more valuable BP. As part of this process, we are proposing changes that would result in a reduction in roles,” a BP spokesperson told Reuters without confirming the number of jobs that will be cut.
Upstream Online reported the news earlier on Thursday.
(Reporting by Stephanie Kelly in London and Raechel Thankam Job in Bengaluru; Editing by Diti Pujara, Susan Fenton and Tomasz Janowski)
