The BP Group history

BP's controversial legacy played no small part in the political rhetoric of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, which ousted the Shah and paved the way for the Islamic Republic.

CEO Sir Peter Walters, who took BP's helm in 1981, guided a five-year acquisitions binge costing approximately £10 billion.

The name British Petroleum Company PLC was adopted in 1982.

In 1987 BP acquired the remainder of the Standard Oil Company for almost $8 billion.

One result of the sale was that by March 1988 the Kuwait Investment Office had built up a 21.6 percent stake in the company; government regulatory authorities subsequently reported that this share was reduced to less than ten percent.

Project 1990 was the brainchild of BP's chairman, Robert Horton.

Horton's personal abrasiveness and tendency to dictate, rather than cultivate, change earned him an unflattering nickname: "The Hatchet." He was forced to resign on June 25, 1992, after BP sustained its first-ever quarterly losses.

International Ltd.'s London office called BP a "big green cash machine" in their fall 1995 report on the oil company.

In 1997, BP announced that it would build its first service stations in Japan.

In merging with United States oil giant Amoco in 1998, the newly created BP Amoco became the one of the largest petroleum concerns in the world.

In the late 20th century BP was a major investor in green energy, and in 2003 the company unveiled the slogan “Beyond Petroleum.” However, within a decade BP had scaled back its renewable energy efforts.

In 2005, an explosion in a BP refinery in Texas killed 15 workers.

In 2006, over 250,000 gallons of oil spilled through corroded sections of the BP pipeline in Alaska across the North Slope, leading to a partial shutdown of the company's Prudhoe Bay field and a costly cleanup.

In 2012 BP agreed to pay more than $4.5 billion in fines and penalties to the United States government and to plead guilty to 14 criminal charges.