Innovative thinkers
Although his father was an oil man, Philippe Herve never expected to find himself in the oil and gas business. Herve was born in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, but his family relocated to France, a few years later. His father’s career as a field engineer for Schlumberger required frequent travel, exposing Herve to a variety of new places with diverse cultural backgrounds, from Kuwait to Burma.
While studying civil engineering at the Institut national des Sciences appliquées de Rennes (National Institute of Applied Sciences in Rennes, France), Herve joined a sailing club. Sailing competitively not only solidified Herve’s love for travel, but also established an affinity for innovation. “When sailing, you have to pay attention to the details,” he explained. “It is all about the speed of the boat, and how you can make things work faster.”
Herve says he primarily sailed on a 470, a monohull planing dinghy that is typically handled by a two-person crew. While training to go to the summer Olympics, and competing against the world’s top sailing teams, Herve worked on mast and sail designs that would give him the advantage in a race. Ultimately, Herve never made it to the Olympics, but won several national titles and championships. He often jokes that while he did not get to go to the Olympics, due to a political boycott of the games, he took the time to relax and won his gold medal when he met his wife.
His 22-year career with Schlumberger combined many of the things he was most passionate about—science and engineering, world travel, and innovation. He started as a field engineer for the company’s wireline group, but over time, held a variety of roles within the lead operation, research, engineering and manufacturing groups. However, it wasn’t until Herve worked at Schlumberger’s Doll Research Center in Ridgefield, Conn., that he found his true passion. While working to develop and patent new solutions related to corrosion prediction and detection, he was struck by the seemingly endless possibilities of artificial intelligence (AI).
Today, Herve serves as V.P. of oil and gas at SparkCognition, a cognitive analytics company with a platform designed specifically for the protection, monitoring and optimization of oil and gas operations. “AI allows companies to detect failure on an asset before it occurs,” Herve said. “These predictive capabilities allow companies to increase uptime and maximize their overall operations.”
As the former CEO of a cybersecurity company, Herve also has been working to attract the oil and gas industry’s attention to the importance of data protection. “Our industry is behind others in terms of cybersecurity. For some reason, oil and gas seems to be resisting these technologies, when it should be adopting them,” he explained. “I am still baffled as to why our industry is not more concerned or actively adding modern protections when the Department of Energy is warning the industry that oil and gas is a strong target to cyber villains.”
Through his network and knowledge of the oil and gas industry, Herve has facilitated the development of SparkCognition’s patented data-driven AI solutions. This includes solutions for predictive maintenance, cybersecurity and automated model building. To keep rigs up and running, and safe from cyber attacks, the company is implementing cutting-edge AI solutions that can significantly reduce downtime for oil and gas operations. Through the use of data and machine learning techniques, it provides operators with the ability to predict potential asset failures before they occur.
Ultimately, with these different offerings, Herve hopes to apply that same drive for innovation he has always had to revolutionize the oil and gas industry. This passes muster for the entire company, as its website mission statement reads, “AI is not just evolution, it’s revolution.” 
