Olivier Thorel

Mr. Olivier Thorel joined Saudi Aramco on January 1, 2018 and holds the position of Vice President Chemicals and low carbon Hydrogen, leading the existing business as well as the ambitious Chemicals and low carbon Hydrogen growth agenda of Saudi Aramco.

Prior to joining Saudi Aramco, Olivier spent 27 years with Shell, where he held various roles in Chemicals manufacturing, sales, marketing, and supply chain. Based in France, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom, he eventually rose to the position of global general manager within Chemicals and Lubricants. Olivier then moved on to Houston, Texas to become vice president of supply, distribution, and Shell pipelines for North America.

From 2013 until 2017, Olivier led various parts of Shell Chemicals as vice president of global intermediates from the company’s Singapore office before serving as vice president of Chemicals Asia, Ventures and New Business Development.

During his tenure at Aramco, Olivier has held director positions at the Boards of Satorp, Sadara, FREP (China) and PRefChem (Malaysia). He is now a Board Director of SABIC and the Chairperson of its Risk and Sustainability Committee.

Olivier is French, married with four children. He graduated from Ecole Polytechnique in 1988 and holds a master’s degree in finance from Universite Paris-Dauphine. He also completed an executive MBA at Insead in 2002.

Session:

Day 1 | 6 December 2022 | Leadership dialogue 1 – Clean energy transition – The GCC’s opportunity towards world leadership