|
The Williams Companies,
Inc. is an energy company based in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Its core
business is natural gas exploration, production, processing, and
transportation, with additional petroleum and electricity
generation assets. A Fortune 200 company, its common stock is a
component of the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Utility Average.
It was founded as Williams
Brothers in 1908 by Miller and David Williams in Fort Smith,
Arkansas, and soon expanded to building nationwide pipelines for
natural gas and petroleum. The company relocated to Tulsa in
1919.
The company went public in
1957 under the Williams Brothers name. As it diversified in the
1970s, it was renamed The Williams Companies, Inc. Since 1997,
their brand identity has been simplified to "Williams".
In 1966, Williams bought
the then-largest petroleum products pipeline in America, known
as the Great Lakes Pipe Line Company, for about $287 million. In
1982, it expanded into natural gas transportation with the
purchase of Northwest Energy Company, and extended their reach
to the East Coast with the 1995 purchase of Transco Energy
Company.
In 2001, Williams acquired
Barrett Resources, which provided them with additional national
gas reserves. |
