It is not so long ago that the processing within westernGeco became part of Geosolutions. (After the initial round of major layoffs in late 2014, early 2015) This left only the acquisition portion retained as WesternGeco. There were subsequent fleet and staff reductions within that remaining part. Then suddenly all of the arms of WesternGeco that joined Geosolutions were no longer Geosolutions and were put back into WesternGeco. Purely for P&L reasons, hmm.
Then we all know about the ongoing trimming of staff across the board. Seismic acquisition and processing has always been traditionally "squeezed" even when times are good. In economic downturn it really suffers. It makes sense for Schlumberger to offload a very trimmed down, reunited WesternGeco now before the real crunch hits in 2017. I can envision a merger of CGG-Veritas and WesternGeco. The Richmond campus is expensive sell WesternGeco and move the remaining inhabitants of Richmond to Sugar Land.