Postwar history

Stanvac's operations ceased after the Japanese invasion in 1942 but resumed in 1945 after World War II. It started the aviation supply business in 1948, and the first service station in 1949.

By 1958, it had more than 200 employees working in Shaw House at Orchard Road. In 1961, it introduced bottled cooking gas under Stangas and sold 2,000 cylinders that year.

But by 1962, Stanvac was split up - all assets in Singapore and Malaysia were transferred to Standard Oil of New Jersey, better known as Esso. The Pegasus logo was replaced by the Esso oval, and Stangas became Essogas.

Meanwhile, Stanvac's other former partners formed Mobil Oil Malaysia Sdn. Bhd. By 1964, it set up the first Mobil service station at Pasir Panjang, expanding to 14 stations a year later.

In 1963, Mobil went into refining, realising Singapore's first refinery with a 18,000 barrel-per-day (bpd) capacity in 1966 at Pioneer Road in Jurong. Its refining capacity stepped up 10-fold to 180,000 bpd by the late 1970s, today the nameplate capacity of this modern facility stands at 309,000 bpd.

By the late sixties, Esso also entered the refining business, resulting in a 90,000 bpd refinery built on Pulau Ayer Chawan (now called Jurong Island), in 1970. The facility has a current nameplate capacity of 296,000 bpd.