Marathon Oil has completed a Woodford Shale well using a new money saving drilling and completion technology:

http://www.rigzone.com/news/article.asp?a_id=71367

The article says "the world's first totally interventionless gas well completion." What is the signifigance of that?

horizontal wells present some unique challenges in performing stimulation treatments (frac's). this technology provides a means to isolate zones within the lateral such that they can be treated individually.

http://www.exprogroup.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=176&...

other methods include running a pre perforated liner, "swell" packers for zone isolation, or making multiple runs with coiled tubing.

older completions were either not frac'ed, frac'ed with a single stage or used diverting agents such as ball sealers or fine mesh sand.