Baker Hughes Co.
Baker Hughes Company (BKR)
Overview
Baker Hughes is a global energy technology company co-headquartered in Houston, Texas, and London, UK, operating in more than 120 countries and employing roughly 56,000 people. It traces its roots to the 1987 merger of Hughes Tool Company (founded 1908, inventor of the two-cone drill bit) and Baker Oil Tools (founded 1913), and it grew substantially through later acquisitions, most notably its 2017 combination with GE's Oil & Gas business, which broadened it well beyond traditional oilfield services into industrial and energy-transition technology. Baker Hughes generated roughly $27.7 billion in revenue in fiscal 2025 and carries a market capitalization in the $60+ billion range, positioning it as one of the largest oilfield services and energy-equipment companies in the world alongside SLB (Schlumberger) and Halliburton, while also competing as an industrial equipment maker in gas compression, LNG, and industrial technology markets.
What They Do & How They Make Money
Baker Hughes makes money by selling equipment, technology, and services used to find, extract, process, and move oil, natural gas, and increasingly other forms of energy, plus a growing industrial equipment and software business that serves customers beyond oil and gas entirely. On the traditional oilfield side, the company sells and rents drilling equipment (drill bits, downhole tools), well-completion equipment, artificial lift systems, subsea production systems, and a wide range of technical field services to oil and gas operators drilling and producing wells — revenue here is tied closely to global rig counts, oil and gas prices, and capital spending by exploration and production companies. On the industrial and energy technology side — the legacy GE Oil & Gas business — Baker Hughes designs and manufactures large rotating equipment such as gas turbines, compressors, and turboexpanders used in natural gas processing and liquefaction (LNG) plants, pipelines, and industrial facilities, sold both as capital equipment (often on long lead-time, multi-year contracts) and through recurring aftermarket parts and services revenue over the equipment's decades-long operating life. This segment increasingly also sells technology aimed at the energy transition — carbon capture, hydrogen, geothermal, and emissions-monitoring equipment — positioning Baker Hughes as a supplier to both conventional hydrocarbon producers and to newer, lower-carbon energy infrastructure buildouts, notably the ongoing global boom in LNG export capacity.
Business Segments
Baker Hughes reports two primary segments:
- Oilfield Services & Equipment (OFSE) — the traditional oilfield business covering the full well lifecycle: drilling, evaluation, completions, production, intervention, and subsea systems, plus decommissioning. This segment generated roughly $14.3 billion in combined revenue in fiscal 2025 (Oilfield Services ~$11.2 billion plus Oilfield Equipment ~$3.1 billion), though revenue was down modestly from 2024 amid softer oilfield activity.
- Industrial & Energy Technology (IET) — the former GE Oil & Gas-derived business, covering gas technology equipment and services (turbines, compressors, and equipment for LNG and gas processing), industrial products (valves, gears, non-destructive testing/inspection equipment, pipeline services), and industrial software/asset-performance solutions, alongside emerging climate technology (carbon capture, hydrogen, emissions management, geothermal). This segment generated roughly $13.4 billion in combined revenue in fiscal 2025 (Gas Technology ~$9.6 billion, Industrial Technology ~$3.1 billion, Climate Technology Solutions ~$0.6 billion), and was the company's growth engine in 2025, driven substantially by strong global LNG-related equipment orders.
Combined, Baker Hughes reported total revenue of about $27.7 billion in fiscal 2025 (roughly flat versus 2024's $27.8 billion) and net income of about $2.6 billion. IET's order backlog (remaining performance obligations) has been growing to record levels — reported around $37 billion in mid-2026 — reflecting the multi-year nature of large LNG and gas-technology equipment contracts.
Competitors
Baker Hughes competes across distinct product categories against different sets of rivals:
- Oilfield services and equipment: SLB (formerly Schlumberger) and Halliburton are Baker Hughes' two closest and largest direct competitors, together with Baker Hughes forming the traditional "big three" of global oilfield services; Weatherford International and NOV Inc. compete in overlapping equipment and services niches.
- Gas technology / LNG and industrial equipment: Siemens Energy, GE Vernova, and Chart Industries compete in turbomachinery, compression, and LNG-related equipment; Honeywell and Emerson compete in adjacent industrial process technology and controls.
- Industrial products and software: Emerson Electric, ABB, and Siemens compete broadly in industrial automation, valves, and asset-performance software.
- Smaller, regionally focused equipment and service providers also compete for share in specific product lines and geographies, particularly in mature, price-competitive oilfield service markets.
Competitive Position
Baker Hughes' competitive position rests on its scale and technical breadth as one of the few companies able to serve customers across the entire energy value chain — from drilling a well to liquefying and exporting the gas that comes out of it. Its IET segment, inherited largely from GE, gives it a distinctive position among the oilfield-services peer group: unlike SLB and Halliburton, which remain more purely oilfield-services focused, Baker Hughes has meaningful exposure to LNG and gas-processing capital equipment, an area benefiting from a multi-year global wave of LNG export terminal construction, and to early-stage energy-transition technologies like carbon capture and hydrogen. Long equipment lifecycles in the IET segment also generate durable, high-margin aftermarket services revenue that smooths out some of the cyclicality inherent in oilfield services. The company's global footprint (120+ countries) and technical expertise in rotating equipment, subsea systems, and drilling technology represent meaningful barriers to entry, particularly in complex offshore and LNG-related equipment where few competitors have comparable engineering depth.
Key risks include the fundamentally cyclical nature of oilfield services, which rise and fall with oil and gas prices and E&P capital spending — as reflected in OFSE's revenue decline in 2025 amid softer drilling activity; geopolitical exposure given significant international and offshore operations in politically sensitive regions; execution risk on large, multi-year LNG and gas-technology equipment contracts, where cost overruns or delivery delays can pressure margins; and longer-term energy-transition risk, as the pace and shape of the shift away from fossil fuels could affect demand for core oilfield equipment even as Baker Hughes tries to offset this with its climate-technology and LNG-equipment offerings. Commodity price volatility, currency risk from extensive international operations, and intense competitive pricing pressure from SLB and Halliburton in oilfield services also remain persistent threats to margins.