PetroChina Company Limited, the listed arm of state-owned China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), adopted its current flower-shaped logo on December 26, 2004. The mark, jointly owned by PetroChina and its parent company CNPC, replaced a patchwork of earlier internal identities with a single unified brand system across the entire group.[1][2]
Design and History
The logo is a petal graphic equally divided into ten sections in red and yellow, the basic colors of China’s national flag, which also reflect the characteristics of the oil and gas industry.[1][3] The overall shape is round, symbolizing PetroChina’s global development strategy.[3]
Before the 2004 unification, the CNPC group had used multiple visual identities across its subsidiaries, which limited the potential of its intangible brand assets. The integration effort, announced through a group notice on standardizing the corporate logo, was framed as a strategic move to build a unified brand and strengthen the company’s image as an international oil company.[3][4] After the new logo was introduced, all previous logos used by the group, the listed company and its subsidiaries were discontinued.[3]
In Chinese, the mark is commonly called “Baoshihua” (宝石花), meaning “gem flower.”[5][6]
Meaning and Symbolism
CNPC’s official description of the logo details several layers of meaning:[7][3]
- The ten equal petals represent the company’s core businesses.
- The red base, which highlights one corner of a square shape, expresses the company’s solid foundation and implies its cohesion and creativity.
- The flower-like appearance reflects the company’s social responsibility for creating harmony between energy development and the environment.
- The rising sun in the center, with rays of light, symbolizes a prosperous future.
The flower-shaped logo and its red-and-yellow color combination are intended to make the CNPC brand stand out and enhance public recognition.[7]
Typography and Design
Alongside the new logo, CNPC issued a visual identity manual (视觉形象识别手册) to govern the logo’s use across the group, mandating consistency in how the mark and its accompanying wordmark appear in corporate materials.[4] No specific typeface or designer attribution for the logo has been publicly documented in the available sources.
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