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BP plc (official styling BP p.l.c., formerly The British Petroleum Company plc and BP Amoco plc) is a British multinational oil and gas company headquartered in London, England. It is one of the world's seven oil and gas "supermajors".It is a vertically integrated company operating in all areas of the oil and gas industry, including exploration and production, refining, distribution and marketing, power generation, and trading. It also has renewable energy interests in biofuels, wind power, smart grid, and solar technology.
As of 31 December 2018, BP had operations in nearly 80 countries worldwide, produced around 3.7 million barrels per day (590,000 m3/d) of oil equivalent, and had total proven reserves of 19.945 billion barrels (3.1710×109 m3) of oil equivalent.The company has around 18,700 service stations worldwide.Its largest division is BP America in the United States. In Russia, BP owns a 19.75% stake in Rosneft, the world's largest publicly traded oil and gas company by hydrocarbon reserves and production.BP has a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. It has secondary listings on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange. In the 2020 Forbes Global 2000, BP was ranked as the 357th-largest public company in the world.
BP's origins date back to the founding of the Anglo-Persian Oil Company in 1908, established as a subsidiary of Burmah Oil Company to exploit oil discoveries in Iran. In 1935, it became the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company and in 1954, adopted the name British Petroleum.In 1959, the company expanded beyond the Middle East to Alaska and it was one of the first companies to strike oil in the North Sea. British Petroleum acquired majority control of Standard Oil of Ohio in 1978. Formerly majority state-owned, the British government privatised the company in stages between 1979 and 1987. British Petroleum merged with Amoco in 1998, becoming BP Amoco plc, and acquired ARCO and Burmah Castrol in 2000, becoming BP plc in 2001. From 2003 to 2013, BP was a partner in the TNK-BP joint venture in Russia.