Good morning. BP makes history in its C-suite.
Fortune’s energy editor, Jordan Blum, reported that BP hired Woodside Energy leader Meg O’Neill as CEO, effective April 1. Current BP CEO Murray Auchincloss stepped down on Thursday but will serve in an advisory role through 2026, while Carol Howle, BP’s EVP of supply, trading, and shipping, will serve as interim CEO.
O’Neill will become the first-ever woman chief executive of a Big Oil giant—typically defined as BP, Shell, Exxon Mobil, Chevron, and TotalEnergies. In addition, BP is the only one among its peers that will have a woman in both the CEO and CFO positions. Kate Thomson became the finance chief of BP in February 2024 after serving as interim CFO. Thomson is the first woman to serve as CFO at the company.
Blum writes that O’Neill is “taking over the British energy behemoth at a time when it has fallen behind the other global oil and gas supermajors and was even a potential takeover target earlier this year by rival Shell.” She is succeeding Auchincloss, “who was hardly considered the top candidate to lead BP, but the former chief financial officer was thrust into the role in late 2023 when then-CEO Bernard Looney was abruptly forced to resign over relationships with colleagues,” he writes.
O’Neill is an Exxon Mobil veteran who grew Australia’s Woodside into a much bigger global natural gas player with expansions into the U.S. She and Thomson are set to become strategic partners. Thomson has worked at BP for more than 20 years, serving as VP of finance for production and operations before becoming CFO.
Additional Big Oil companies where women are finance chiefs include Exxon Mobil SVP and CFO Kathryn A. Mikells, who has held the role since 2021, but is retiring in February due to health issues, and Shell CFO Sinead Gorman, who has been finance chief since 2022; both earned a spot on the Fortune 2025 Most Powerful Women list.
Outside of Big Oil, Fortune’s Emma Hinchliffe notes another woman at the top: Vicki Hollub (No. 90 on the Fortune 2025 Most Powerful Women list) has been CEO of Occidental Petroleum since 2016, making her the first woman to lead a major American oil company.
Have a good weekend. See you on Monday. Sheryl Estrada [email protected]
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