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NEXT<br />
GENERATION 2012
Welcome<br />
from the editor<br />
WHEN I took over as editor of Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong>, I was very clear that the focus of our journalistic eff orts<br />
should be directed at uncovering business opportunities and identifying risk for our readers. It<br />
was inevitable then that we should end up extending our ‘most infl uential people in shipping’<br />
series to produce a supplement looking at the next generation of shipping industry leaders.<br />
The opportunities that await our bright young things rest on their ability to learn from the<br />
past, innovate and deal with a new and rapidly evolving market that is laden with a level of<br />
fi nancial sophistication that many of their predecessors would barely recognise.<br />
The challenge for the shipping industry as a whole has always been its ability to attract and<br />
retain the necessary talent to drive the industry forward.<br />
This inaugural look at the mari<strong>time</strong> sector’s current crop of new leaders analyses the<br />
ambitious heirs apparent who have made the grade. These upstarts will inevitably feature in<br />
future editions of the Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong> Top 100 most infl uential people in shipping and it seems that<br />
the current generation has made a decent job of its succession planning.<br />
Our list is by no means complete and we acknowledge the limitations of such a project. We<br />
have focused on shipping’s family dynasties, on those sons and daughters who have rolled up<br />
their sleeves and got involved in the business, for this fi rst cut. But we will revisit the theme in<br />
the future, with new angles and new names. When we do, we will look to you for suggestions of<br />
the names we have missed or new sectors that we can include.<br />
As I noted when we produced last year’s Top 100, the Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong> newsroom off ers one of the<br />
best vantage points from which to view the entire industry. Even so, I am under no illusion that<br />
we have produced a list that everyone will agree with and I welcome feedback on this and every<br />
other aspect of Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong>’s output.<br />
For now, though, this generational take on the future of shipping stands as a positive indicator<br />
of the hard work, sophistication, innovation and talent that resides within the shipping industry.<br />
The future looks to be in safe hands.<br />
Richard Meade<br />
Editor, Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong><br />
Richard.meade@lloydslist.com<br />
@Richard_Meade<br />
NEXT<br />
GENERATION 2012<br />
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next generation 2012 3
introduction<br />
the generation game<br />
Why the current crop of shipowners is pushing<br />
forward with old values and a new vision<br />
SHIPPING is a long-term business based on relationships, trust<br />
and generational investment strategies.<br />
Continuity is vital, so for all the talk of asset plays and shortterm<br />
speculative investment, it is perhaps not surprising that<br />
the mari<strong>time</strong> sector is still dominated by family dynasties.<br />
From privately owned, patriarch-led powerhouses to the<br />
corporate colossuses, shipping remains uniquely populated by<br />
the sons and daughters of shipowners.<br />
Shipping, it seems, is in the blood.<br />
The transition from one generation to the next in any<br />
business can be difficult. While everyone hopes for a process<br />
that reinvigorates tradition with fresh thinking, technical knowhow<br />
and modern market nous, it can equally end up weakening<br />
a business and put it on a journey to extinction.<br />
In most other sectors it is estimated that around 70% of<br />
businesses do not make it through a second generation of<br />
leadership. Few make it to three.<br />
Shipping somehow seems different and special because of<br />
this.<br />
4 next generation 2012<br />
This special report highlights the fact that there is no onesize-fits-all<br />
policy when it comes to succession planning in<br />
shipping. There are those who have trained within the family,<br />
ready to take on the mantle when the <strong>time</strong> arrives and there are<br />
many who have set out by themselves with their own shipping<br />
ventures. But the sheer volume of offspring choosing to follow<br />
the family line and stay in shipping is a testament to the vibrant<br />
and compelling nature of shipping as a truly global career<br />
brimming with opportunity.<br />
So addictive is it that the next generation is often left waiting<br />
for the previous generation to loosen its grip a little. Retirement<br />
is apparently something that happens in other industries, but<br />
not in shipping.<br />
The upstart examples we have picked in this report are far<br />
from comprehensive and represent only a snapshot of the current<br />
crop of talent coming through the ranks. Nevertheless, our next<br />
generation flag bearers boast an impressively diverse range of<br />
backgrounds, education and strategies, proving that diversity is<br />
alive and well when it comes to shipping’s family businesses.
World Leader<br />
in RoRo transport<br />
Via Marchese Campodisola, 13<br />
80133 Naples - ITALY<br />
Phn +39 081 496 111<br />
Fax +39 081 551 74 01<br />
switchboard@grimaldi.napoli.it<br />
www.grimaldi.napoli.it<br />
M. Di Lorenzo
introduction<br />
Every generation looks to the last for direction and lessons<br />
learned. Our latest batch of industry leaders has more than<br />
enough to chew on as it deliberates what went wrong and<br />
forges its own path ahead.<br />
It is difficult to characterise generational traits amid a diverse<br />
array of individuals and companies that we have picked for<br />
this report, but it seem fair to conclude that our crop of young<br />
leaders has become more sophisticated than its predecessors.<br />
They appear more risk aware, although it should be noted<br />
that is very different from being risk averse. This generation<br />
has seen the extremes that a shipping cycle has to offer and<br />
risk management is high on the agenda, even as it searches<br />
for the opportunities that history tells it must be waiting at the<br />
bottom.<br />
They are more concerned with corporate governance and<br />
are certainly more transparent than the last generation who<br />
gave up information as if it were their market share.<br />
Many in our list cite the need to focus on low leverage, strong<br />
cash flows and the ability to survive downturns. Ironically it<br />
is the impatient young upstarts that are taking that long-term<br />
outlook.<br />
While the fundamentals of shipping remain, our next<br />
generation will lead an entirely different market that is driven<br />
by new political realities and a rapidly changing global<br />
economic and regulatory agenda.<br />
Perhaps even more significantly they enter an industry on<br />
the cusp of a technical generational shift driven by fuel costs<br />
6 next generation 2012<br />
“the next generation<br />
is often left waiting<br />
for the previous<br />
generation to<br />
loosen its grip a<br />
little. retirement is<br />
apparently something<br />
that happens in other<br />
industries, but not in<br />
shipping”<br />
and the need to rethink much of the global supply chain in<br />
search of efficiencies.<br />
But for all their attempts to differentiate themselves from the<br />
previous generation, many of those we have spoken to cite the<br />
old values of hard work, integrity and loyalty as the guiding<br />
principles for any modern business.<br />
In a highly cyclical industry, it pays to have a tangible<br />
reminder of what has worked and what has not. Family<br />
businesses tend to have long memories, a fact that can be an<br />
advantage just as it can weigh heavily on those who inherit it.<br />
There is something special about shipping that only insiders<br />
can understand. People have a genuine passion for it that you<br />
do not tend to see in quite the same way elsewhere. For the<br />
shipping dynasties, that feeling is intensified.<br />
While the weight of expectation can be unreasonably<br />
high for some, the power that a family business wields can<br />
be highly advantageous. When successfully pulling in the<br />
same direction, families are more nimble in their decisionmaking<br />
than companies that have to convince shareholders<br />
and boards. They can also make long-term decisions without<br />
concern for quarterly dividends, bound in the knowledge that<br />
eventually they will come out ahead.<br />
But for all their advantages, the continued success of the<br />
shipping dynasties is by no means guaranteed. While success<br />
can often breed success, business skills are not genetic. Sound<br />
succession planning is as much about finding the right talent<br />
in family businesses as it is anywhere else.
Greece<br />
Maria Angelicoussis<br />
Under doctor’s orders<br />
Maria Angelicoussis hopes to sustain the health of the family business<br />
PURELY private shipowners on the scale of the Angelicoussis<br />
Shipping Group are nowadays virtually unknown and the<br />
group’s future is a subject of fascination.<br />
Revered though founder Anthony Angelicoussis was, son<br />
John Angelicoussis has surely surpassed him, cementing<br />
a group synonymous with the Greek flag, widely lauded<br />
for quality, and the largest in Greece in no fewer than three<br />
sectors of shipping – tankers, dry bulk and liquefied natural<br />
gas carriers.<br />
What the future holds would seem to depend to a great<br />
extent on 30-year-old Maria Angelicoussis, daughter of John<br />
and wife Elizabeth.<br />
The qualified doctor, who practised medicine in the UK,<br />
joined the shipping group three and a half years ago — after,<br />
she tells Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong>, “becoming progressively more curious<br />
about a business which is most probably in my DNA and<br />
which I will manage”.<br />
Eight years in medicine may not have been the worst<br />
training for shipping success. According to Ms Angelicoussis,<br />
common denominators include the need for multi-tasking,<br />
delivering under pressure and communicating clearly.<br />
“Dealing with and reading people is also key,” she says.<br />
Thoroughness, attention to detail and an analytical mind are<br />
among traits required of a good doctor that Ms Angelicoussis<br />
believes also have a place in shipping management.<br />
Moreover, though she has no engineering background,<br />
neither is she fazed by the technical aspects. Instead she likes<br />
the tangibility and enjoys mastering them.<br />
“He has taught me to think out<br />
of the box and be imaginative<br />
and that there is always a<br />
solution to any problem,<br />
usually a commercial one”<br />
Ms Angelicoussis had only a few weeks of experience under<br />
her belt when she was put in charge of solving a headlinemaking<br />
commercial dispute with Fortescue Metals, the<br />
giant mining group that had defaulted on a five-year charter<br />
on an Anangel capesize. Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong> reported the affair<br />
was eventually amicably settled, resulting in an expanded<br />
relationship with three new five-year charters.<br />
“Being thrown in at the deep end feels like an<br />
understatement,” she says today. “I ended up not only<br />
learning a lot, but also putting the relationship of our two<br />
companies on a new and — I believe — better footing.”<br />
Maria Angelicoussis:<br />
shipping is all about<br />
relationships<br />
Greece<br />
Ms Angelicoussis credits her father with having achieved<br />
the tricky balance of guiding, but also giving her freedom to<br />
cut her own path and learn from her own mistakes.<br />
“He has taught me to think out of the box and be imaginative<br />
and that there is always a solution to any problem, usually a<br />
commercial one,” she says.<br />
When asked about her own ambitions, Ms Angelicoussis<br />
simply replies: “To maintain the first-class standards that we<br />
possess as a company, being innovative and ahead of new<br />
developments, while at the same <strong>time</strong> being competitive and<br />
loyal to our long-standing clients.<br />
“My father has taught me that this industry is all about<br />
relationships.”<br />
Her late grandfather, too, would surely have nodded in<br />
appreciation.<br />
next generation 2012 7
2nd engineer Badesha will be home early
The MV Hercules was scheduled to leave for<br />
Paradip at 6.00 pm today. Earlier a Nav/Com<br />
specialist was scheduled to install an update<br />
of the ship’s communication system. Instead<br />
Imtech Marine completed the job last week.<br />
Without setting foot on board. It is now<br />
8.20 am and the MV Hercules is on her way.<br />
Adil Badesha will be home early.<br />
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around the expertise of Radio Holland.<br />
We support your business worldwide from<br />
25 countries and 89 locations. Find out<br />
more at www.imtechmarine.com/services.
Greece<br />
Greece<br />
economou family<br />
Key roles for kin in economou empire<br />
LNG remit for son Christos while nephew Anthony Kandylidis looks after offshore<br />
GEORGE Economou’s shipping empire has grown increasingly<br />
diversified in recent years. While the dry bulk and tanker sectors<br />
are far from being ignored by the entrepreneur, it should come<br />
as no surprise that investments have favoured two hot sectors<br />
that are outshining the rest of the shipping markets: liquefied<br />
natural gas carriers and offshore. Although Mr Economou has a<br />
highly capable team of executives backing him, it is noticeable<br />
that the roles of spearheading development in these two key<br />
sectors have gone to close kin.<br />
Son Christos Economou has taken charge of the Cardiff<br />
Marine group’s move into the LNG sector and is said to be<br />
personally handling this part of the business empire.<br />
After majoring in quantitative economics at Tufts University<br />
in the US and obtaining his masters at Massachusetts Institute of<br />
Technology, Christos Economou started his professional career<br />
as a Wall Street M&A banker but quickly turned to shipping. He<br />
joined Heidmar and its tanker chartering and trading platform<br />
before deciding to enter the private family shipping business.<br />
In addition to the diversification into LNG, he has established<br />
an in-house investments and trading division, which he<br />
continues to oversee, and is understood to also be involved in<br />
the day-to-day management of the tanker division.<br />
The LNG division comprises a recently acquired 2004-built<br />
145,000 cu m vessel, Fugi LNG, which continues to be managed<br />
for Cardiff by sellers Oman Shipping, as well as four 159,800 cu<br />
m newbuildings for delivery in 2014 from Daewoo Shipbuilding<br />
& Marine Engineering. Altogether, the move represents an<br />
investment of more than $1bn.<br />
The younger Mr Economou’s challenges include not only<br />
chartering of the new vessels, one of which has recently been<br />
fixed for close to four years at what is described as “a very strong<br />
10 next generation 2012<br />
Offshore focus:<br />
Anthony Kandylidis<br />
rate”, but also taking the management of the first LNG vessel inhouse.<br />
According to company sources, the group sees potential<br />
to grow further in the LNG sector.<br />
In another sign of the younger Mr Economou’s<br />
entrepreneurial mettle, he has headed up the $500m Oceanus<br />
fund for investment in distressed shipping assets.<br />
Meanwhile, the key Nasdaq-listed ultra-deepwater drilling<br />
arm of the group, DryShips’ subsidiary Ocean Rig UDW, appears<br />
to be largely under the supervision of Mr Economou’s nephew,<br />
Anthony Kandylidis.<br />
Mr Kandylidis, 35, is seen internally as the current right<br />
hand of the globetrotting tycoon and has already amassed a<br />
formidable curriculum vitae.<br />
He spent four years at OMI, chiefly in the commercial<br />
department, and has previously described this start to his<br />
career as “being in the right place, at the right <strong>time</strong>, with the<br />
right people”.<br />
In 2006, Mr Kandylidis founded OceanFreight Inc as a<br />
shipowner with a fleet of bulkers and tankers, which he took<br />
public the following year with a listing on Nasdaq.<br />
Over the next four years, the company was repositioned as an<br />
owner of large modern bulk carriers with a fleet of four capesizes<br />
and two panamaxes in the water as well as five very large ore<br />
carriers on order in China.<br />
The company, at the <strong>time</strong> majority-owned by Mr Kandylidis,<br />
was absorbed by DryShips in a 2011 merger valued at $238m.<br />
Mr Kandylidis, who is said to be a frequent traveller to Ocean<br />
Rig’s headquarters in Norway but keeps tabs on other aspects<br />
of the group’s shipping business as well, graduated from Brown<br />
University in the US and obtained his masters in ocean systems<br />
management at MIT.<br />
Driving LNG:<br />
Christos Economou
The Angelopoulos brothers:<br />
George and Panayotis<br />
Greece<br />
constantinos Angelopoulos family<br />
educated in economics and enterprise<br />
Constantinos Angelopoulos’ sons are well-equipped for life at the helm<br />
IF A good grasp of economics and entrepreneurship are<br />
cornerstones of success in shipping today, Panayotis and<br />
George Angelopoulos are certainly qualified to shine.<br />
Father Constantinos Angelopoulos has been acclaimed<br />
for the vision and inspiration that led to the emergence of<br />
Arcadia Shipmanagement as a blue-chip tanker owner and<br />
of Aegean Bulk, its counterpart in dry bulk carriers. But, for<br />
many years now, both sons have been intimately involved in<br />
the family’s diversified interests, including shipping, steel<br />
and the Olympiacos basketball club among other things.<br />
Associates say that it has been George, 18 months junior<br />
to Panayiotis, who has taken the lead on the shipping side<br />
although the brothers, sitting in adjacent offices at the<br />
group’s Athens headquarters, are said to co-operate fluidly.<br />
Panayiotis Angelopoulos obtained an economics degree<br />
at Boston University while George Angelopoulos, now 37,<br />
received an MBA in entrepreneurship from nearby Babson<br />
College, a recognised top school for entrepreneurial leaders.<br />
Arcadia was launched in 1998 and immediately took a<br />
distinctive approach that would not gain extensive currency<br />
Greece<br />
in Greek shipping until some years later. From the start<br />
the focus was on purpose-built newbuildings and a high<br />
quality, environmental management culture.<br />
So far Arcadia has taken delivery of 16 aframax and<br />
suezmax tanker newbuildings from top South Korean<br />
builders Hyundai and Samsung. Meanwhile, bulker sister<br />
company Aegean Bulk, established in 2000, has compiled<br />
an all-new fleet of 13 bulkers ranging from supramaxes to<br />
kamsarmaxes. The first of two new eco-type kamsarmax<br />
newbuilds is due to be added to the fleet this June and will<br />
take the combined fleet to 31 vessels, all newly built for the<br />
group. The long-term commitment to the industry could not<br />
be plainer.<br />
Joining Arcadia as a recipient of the Green Award, Aegean<br />
Bulk became the first dry cargo owner worldwide to earn this<br />
distinction. From the inception of the shipping operation,<br />
the younger generation has had a major say in moulding<br />
the group as a model tanker and bulker owner, combining<br />
principle with a shrewd grasp of the commercial benefits of<br />
running a quality operation.<br />
next generation 2012 11
Greece<br />
Greece<br />
tsavliris family<br />
tsavliris pulls in a third<br />
generation of family members<br />
Offspring of Nicolas, George and Andreas work for salvage company<br />
THE second generation — Nicolas, George and Andreas —<br />
followed in their father’s footsteps, and a handful of their<br />
children are doing the same.<br />
“Like their forebears they are enthused by the salvor’s<br />
mission, dedicated to protecting lives, property and the<br />
environment,” the company tells Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong>.<br />
There are currently four offspring from the third<br />
generation working within the family company and involved<br />
with management across the business. This includes<br />
Nicolas’ daughters, Claire and Alexandra, who joined in<br />
2001 and 2007 respectively. And George’s son Alexander<br />
joined the family business in 2007 at the same <strong>time</strong> as<br />
Andreas’ daughter, Mariela.<br />
“Like their forebears they are<br />
enthused by the salvor’s mission,<br />
dedicated to protecting lives,<br />
property and the environment”<br />
“This young generation of management has brought<br />
a fresh and innovative way of thinking to the company,<br />
and their aim is to continue to keep Tsavliris as one of the<br />
Relatives in tow:<br />
from left, Alexandra,<br />
Alexander, Mariela<br />
and Claire Tsavliris<br />
12 next generation 2012<br />
most active emergency response contractors for mari<strong>time</strong><br />
casualties worldwide,” the company says. In addition, other<br />
Tsavliris children are involved with the mari<strong>time</strong> industry.<br />
Andreas’ son Alexander is currently working as a broker at<br />
ICAP Shipping on its sale and purchase desk.<br />
Tsavliris Salvage Group’s history can be traced back to the<br />
1920s, when Alexander Tsavliris arrived in Piraeus, Greece,<br />
and as a young boy got a job working on a small harbour<br />
tug.<br />
With help from his uncle — who was involved in the coal<br />
bunkering trade — and along with his brothers, Alexander<br />
bought a small wooden tug, which he worked on in the day<br />
and juggled with night school.<br />
He eventually established his own business in 1939 in<br />
London, and at the end of the Second World War purchased<br />
his first ship, which was followed by a building a fleet of dry<br />
cargo ships.<br />
Alexander returned to Piraeus in 1956 and in 1964<br />
established a salvage operation by purchasing a tug, the<br />
first of what would become known as Nisos tugs.<br />
By the mid-1970s, the company had 15 tugs on station in<br />
Greece and throughout the world.<br />
Now, after over half a century at the forefront of the<br />
international salvage industry, Tsavliris has welcomed a<br />
third generation of the family to the company.
Greece<br />
Panayotides family<br />
Villy Panayotides passes<br />
on a passion for shipping<br />
Daughter Ismini says ambition is to preserve and build on Excel’s reputation<br />
ISMINI Panayotides is already being tipped as a rising star after<br />
six years as business development officer of Excel Mari<strong>time</strong><br />
Carriers, the New York-listed dry bulk giant headed by her<br />
father, Greek shipowner Villy Panayotides.<br />
Since September 2008 she has also served as secretary of the<br />
board of directors.<br />
In fact, she has been steeped in the mari<strong>time</strong> business since<br />
the age of 10.<br />
“I remember spending almost all of my summer holidays<br />
from a young age at our Piraeus offices at the <strong>time</strong>, contributing<br />
in my own way — such as distributing telexes among the<br />
departments, sending out faxes and even coming up with names<br />
for new vessels added into our fleet,” says Ms Panayotides.<br />
Practical knowledge continued to be accumulated in<br />
shipping during her teen years, working stints in the chartering<br />
and operations departments of Excel’s management subsidiary,<br />
Maryville Mari<strong>time</strong>.<br />
To that is now added boardroom and decision-making<br />
experience, plus a firm grasp of technical, commercial and<br />
financing matters, according to insiders.<br />
Before doing a masters course in shipping, trade and finance<br />
at Cass Business School, London, Ms Panayotides graduated<br />
from Boston University’s management school and is a very<br />
frequent visitor to the US which she considers almost a second<br />
home.<br />
“My father has been a mentor<br />
and great teacher all along, he<br />
was always very supportive<br />
and encouraging of me and my<br />
brothers joining the family business”<br />
She tells Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong>: “There is definitely a steep learning<br />
curve in being an executive of a publicly listed company.<br />
“You are exposed to the public markets and have to be in a<br />
position to continuously show your face and capabilities out<br />
there,” she says. “You invest a lot of <strong>time</strong> and effort to build and<br />
develop relationships with the investor community, investment<br />
banks and analysts, while trying at the same <strong>time</strong> to satisfy both<br />
the short-term expectations of the street as well as the long-term<br />
goals of the company.<br />
“Thus you always need to be formulating a balanced<br />
corporate strategy, setting the right targets for the future, while<br />
Ismini Panayotides:<br />
plans to build on<br />
Excel’s reputation<br />
Greece<br />
selecting, developing and maintaining the right people around<br />
you.<br />
“My father has been a mentor and great teacher all along,”<br />
she says. “He was always very supportive and encouraging of<br />
me and my brothers joining the family business.”<br />
Looking ahead, Ms Panayotides says her main ambition is<br />
to preserve and continue building on the reputation of Excel,<br />
currently the operator of 47 bulk carriers, and to grow it further<br />
as a leader in the industry.<br />
But she would also “like to bring more of a woman’s spirit<br />
and perspective to our shipping community, which is still<br />
dominated by men”.<br />
next generation 2012 13
Greece<br />
Greece<br />
dragnis family<br />
Dragnis sons well versed in shipping cycles<br />
Now chief executive of Goldenport, son John says<br />
his father has taught him to be cautious<br />
JOHN Dragnis became chief executive of London-listed<br />
Goldenport Holdings on April 4 this year, succeeding father<br />
Paris Dragnis. The 34-year-old, who holds a masters in<br />
shipping, trade and finance from Cass Business School,<br />
London, already has 11 years under his belt in the family-led<br />
shipping business. This includes not only Goldenport, which<br />
controls a 25-strong fleet of bulkers and containerships, but<br />
formative roles in privately held tanker company Oceangold<br />
and a large super-yacht business, Atalanta Golden Yachts.<br />
“I and most others of my generation lack the in-depth<br />
knowledge that the previous generation had as men who<br />
came from the sea and spent their lives working on ships<br />
long-term. That was a lot of their success story.”<br />
He adds: “Some of us have spent a few months on board,<br />
but it is not the same thing.”<br />
While this is put down as a disadvantage, it is offset in Mr<br />
Dragnis’ view by a different skill-set, developed to address<br />
changes in the industry. “We have banking and corporate<br />
requirements which the previous generation did not generally<br />
have to deal with. So our advantages include strong banking<br />
relations, more options for financing and a focus on forging<br />
long-term relationships with very corporate counterparties,”<br />
he says.<br />
Mr Dragnis acknowledges that he has been able to draw<br />
upon his father’s first-hand knowledge of ships as well as<br />
past shipping cycles and crises. “As far as he could, he made<br />
me understand the actual business behind the numbers on<br />
the spreadsheet. It is important to know both sides — the<br />
ships and cargoes as well as the balance sheet.”<br />
Greece<br />
Suzanna and odysseas Laskaridis<br />
14 next generation 2012<br />
His upbringing has also stressed the need for prudence.<br />
“Our character is to want to grow and I share this with many<br />
of my colleagues. But I have also been taught to be cautious –<br />
to look behind and not only forward. That means you might<br />
not always grow as fast as you might, but I would prefer to<br />
grow slower and safer,” he says.<br />
Mr Dragnis believes that the recent historic peaks and<br />
troughs of the industry will prove invaluable experience for<br />
today’s young owners. “We are gathering lessons. We have<br />
seen a whole cycle in a relatively short <strong>time</strong>.”<br />
Younger brother Vassilis, 31, has followed him into<br />
shipping and is currently contributing mainly to the tanker<br />
side. “We both love this business and hopefully we will be in<br />
it for a long <strong>time</strong> to come,” says Mr Dragnis.<br />
Laskaridis family looks to the future<br />
Cousins Suzanna and Odysseas have dry bulk ambitions for family business<br />
BROTHERS Panos and Thanassis Laskaridis would appear<br />
to have left little to chance regarding succession in their<br />
business, with families of four and six children, respectively.<br />
But the numbers are not excessive given the variety of<br />
ventures in which the Laskaridis clan is involved.<br />
Although the brothers are perhaps best known as<br />
John Dragnis:<br />
in control at Goldenport<br />
shipowners – and especially as major league reefer owners –<br />
the group has extensive interests in the hospitality business,<br />
one of the jewels of which is the famous Grand Bretagne<br />
hotel in the centre of Athens. It is also the second-largest<br />
shareholder in Aegean Airlines, now the country’s leading<br />
carrier.
Those are just two ventures in a wide range of business<br />
pursuits outside the mari<strong>time</strong> sphere, including both active<br />
and passive ownership interests, in which the family’s new<br />
generation may choose to be involved with.<br />
The shipping business is growing more diverse, too. After<br />
many years of specialising in reefers, Laskaridis Shipping<br />
extended its activities into high seas logistics services, factory<br />
trawlers and, more recently, in reaction to a waning market<br />
for refrigerated vessels, into bulk carriers and tankers. It also<br />
controls two shiprepair yards.<br />
It remains one of the few major owners internationally to<br />
continue renewing its reefer fleet, however.<br />
The eldest offspring of both brothers have been drawn<br />
into, respectively, child psychology and the affiliate business,<br />
Lampsa Hellenic Hotels.<br />
Leading the next generation’s involvement in the shipping<br />
business appear to be Panos’ second daughter and Thanassis’<br />
second son. Suzanna Laskaridis, 30, joined the company<br />
about four years ago and cousin Odysseas Laskaridis, 27,<br />
followed about two years later.<br />
Insiders say they are spending most of their <strong>time</strong> in the<br />
dry bulk and tanker areas of the operation. Suzanna and<br />
Odysseas have already been in the limelight, stepping up on<br />
behalf of Laskaridis Shipping last December to accept the Dry<br />
Greece<br />
Martinos family<br />
Martinos family quick off the<br />
mark with succession strategy<br />
Three brothers separated shipping interests early on<br />
ALWAYS forward-thinking, the Martinos shipping family<br />
began preparing for the arrival of a new generation of owners<br />
and managers fully 20 years ago.<br />
Then, the three brothers heading the family’s highly<br />
successful shipping company, Thenamaris, amicably<br />
determined to separate their interests. This was both to ensure<br />
that the fleet under one roof did not exceed what they felt was a<br />
comfortable upper size limit, but also to differentiate the family<br />
assets to create a clearer future for their various descendants.<br />
In 1991, eldest brother Thanassis Martinos created Eastern<br />
Mediterranean Mari<strong>time</strong> as his own venture, while the<br />
youngest of the trio, Andreas Martinos, followed suit five<br />
years later by launching Minerva Marine. Dinos Martinos has<br />
remained at the helm of Thenamaris which, over the years, has<br />
been recognised as a forerunner of enlightened management<br />
practices such as awarding staff ownership shares in company<br />
vessels. The original family company, the inspiration of family<br />
matriarch Athina Martinou, was founded in 1970 and over the<br />
years has been a springboard for the careers of more than 30<br />
Championing dry bulk:<br />
Suzanna and Odysseas Laskaridis<br />
Greece<br />
Cargo Company of the Year trophy at the Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong> Greek<br />
Shipping Awards.<br />
There, they confirmed the company will seek to further<br />
diversify into dry bulk in future, expanding the fleet at a<br />
“modest and conservative” pace.<br />
other Greek shipowners.<br />
Today, the three Martinos groups control more than 100<br />
ships including tankers, dry bulk carriers, containerships and<br />
liquefied natural gas carrier newbuilds on order.<br />
It has been Thenamaris that has spread its wings most<br />
widely into different sectors with a recent diversification into<br />
boxships and 2011 orders for a first three LNG carriers. Thirtysomething<br />
brothers Yiannis and Nikolas are said to have taken<br />
decisive roles in the management of Thenamaris and are<br />
setting a more corporate course for what is already a widely<br />
admired company.<br />
At Minerva, which has concentrated primarily on tankers,<br />
Andreas Martinos’ son Andreas has already become highly<br />
influential in the company’s leadership.<br />
The succession picture is a little harder to plot at Eastern<br />
Mediterranean. Thanassis Martinos’ daughters are successfully<br />
pursuing careers in medical research and politics, with Georgia<br />
Martinou being elected as a first-<strong>time</strong> member of parliament in<br />
the May 2012 general election.<br />
next generation 2012 15
GerMAny<br />
GerMAny<br />
niels Hartmann<br />
Hartmann handed the reins early on<br />
Niels Hartmann found himself at the helm just four years after joining the group<br />
TAKING the helm of German shipping group Hartmann in<br />
Leer was always an option for Niels Hartmann. His father,<br />
Alfred Hartmann, started the company in the 1980s with a<br />
single vessel and built it into a giant with more than 130 ships.<br />
But Niels Hartmann wanted to keep his options open and<br />
decided to study business management at the University of<br />
Kiel rather than train at a shipping company.<br />
“I took business studies not least to have other possibilities,”<br />
the 37-year-old says, but nevertheless his interest in the<br />
industry was clearly established as his PhD thesis was titled<br />
“National Location Factors for Shipowning Companies”.<br />
After a post-doctorate internship at P&O Nedlloyd’s offices<br />
in Sydney, he decided to give shipping a go. “In 2004, I entered<br />
the company and started to build up the offshore unit,” he says.<br />
In 2007, he was appointed a member of the management board.<br />
<strong>On</strong>e year later, he became chief executive – shortly before the<br />
financial crisis started, bringing him his first big task.<br />
Initially, his father continued to be very active, but “then he<br />
pulled out of the daily business step by step”, Mr Hartmann<br />
says. Alfred Hartmann is still connected to the company via the<br />
16 next generation 2012<br />
Neils Hartmann:<br />
winning the trust of<br />
employees is vital<br />
supervisory board and one of his two daughters also works for<br />
the group and is responsible for the real estate division.<br />
Besides the difficult situation facing most major shipping<br />
markets, the most important challenge for the young chief<br />
executive has been winning over the staff. “Of course, there<br />
are things you do differently, and winning the trust of the<br />
employees is very important,” he says.<br />
At present, he does not have plans to make major changes<br />
to the business’ strategy. “The diversified fleet structure has<br />
been an advantage during the past years,” Mr Hartmann says.<br />
The group owns containerships, gas tankers, offshore vessels<br />
and bulk carriers as well as product tankers and multipurpose<br />
vessels.<br />
Hartmann’s fleet has grown rapidly during the past years,<br />
so ordering newbuildings is not much of a priority right now.<br />
“During the past five years our fleet has more than doubled.<br />
Now we have to see that the organisation grows accordingly,”<br />
he says.<br />
The group’s construction of a new office building in Cyprus is<br />
just one such example of how it intends to fulfil that ambition.
GerMAny<br />
Relative values:<br />
Bertram and Erck Rickmers have<br />
revived the family’s shipping reputation<br />
with their separate companies.<br />
GerMAny<br />
erck and Bertram rickmers<br />
resilience remains a rickmers family trait<br />
Brothers Erck and Bertram have first-hand experience of shipping’s high and lows<br />
THE name Rickmers has a long tradition in shipping. In<br />
1834, Rickmer Clasen Rickmers, who came from the island of<br />
Heligoland, founded a shipbuilding company in Bremerhaven.<br />
Today, the brothers Bertram and Erck Rickmers represent<br />
the fifth generation of the family and are among the most<br />
recognisable faces in the container industry.<br />
If there is one thing that the Rickmers brothers know very<br />
well, it is the ups and downs of the industry because there was<br />
virtually nothing left of the family business by the 1980s, just<br />
a famous name.<br />
“We had to start from zero,” Bertram Rickmers told Lloyd’s<br />
<strong>List</strong> back in June 2009 at the 175th anniversary celebrations of<br />
Rickmers involvement in shipping. “So we had to [risk] more<br />
and work harder. We never became fat and lazy, but were<br />
always pushing ahead, remembering what past generations<br />
had done and wanting to achieve the same.<br />
“We grew up in a family that was always talking about<br />
shipping and shipbuilding. All our lives were somehow<br />
connected [with the industry], so it is very logical that we<br />
ended up in this business,” he added.<br />
In 1992, the brothers jointly founded KG house Nordcapital,<br />
but later decided to go their separate ways. Today, Nordcapital<br />
18 next generation 2012<br />
is part of Erck Rickmers’ group of companies. It also includes<br />
tramp owner ER Schiffahrt, which is about to merge with<br />
fellow company Komroski to create the world’s largest fleet of<br />
charter containerships.<br />
Bertram Rickmers owns tramp owner Rickmers Reederei,<br />
KG house Atlantic as well as heavylift liner company Rickmers-<br />
Linie. Bertram Rickmers recently made the headlines when<br />
he appointed Ron Widdows to lead his holding company, a<br />
rather ironic move because Mr Widdows became known in<br />
Hamburg when he made a bid for Hapag-Lloyd as NOL chief<br />
executive, which was sharply opposed by Hamburg’s mari<strong>time</strong><br />
community.<br />
But the brothers do have one shared venture as they jointly<br />
own London-based shipbroker Harper Petersen, the company<br />
where Erck Rickmers worked after his apprenticeship at Ernst<br />
Russ.<br />
Both brothers have several children: Erck has five daughters,<br />
Bertram two daughters and one son. None of their children<br />
work in the industry or at one of the family companies yet —<br />
but the potential is certainly there. Rather telling was Erck<br />
Rickmers’ statement back in 2009 that “history is only relevant<br />
if it can be continued”.
GerMAny<br />
Schulte family<br />
Schultes size up shipping opportunity<br />
Separate branches of family share strong mari<strong>time</strong> roots<br />
ONE family, two companies has become the motto for the<br />
well-known Rickmers brothers’ entrepreneurial ventures. But<br />
they are not alone with this approach, as it also applies to the<br />
Schulte family.<br />
In 1882, Johann Hermann Schulte and Christoph Bruns<br />
founded a shipbroking company Schulte & Bruns but today, the<br />
Schulte family is active in two separate groups, the Bernhard<br />
Schulte group, led by Heinrich Schulte, and Reederei Thomas<br />
Schulte started by his brother. The latter is now led by Thomas’<br />
son Alexander.<br />
“It was a very speedy transition from my father to me;<br />
shortly after I came into the company, my father started to pull<br />
out,” says 44-year-old Alexander Schulte.<br />
When Mr Schulte took over the helm at Reederei Thomas<br />
Schulte 10 years ago, the company was still comparatively<br />
small. This changed quickly as he rode the wave of booming<br />
shipping markets and expanded the company strongly until it<br />
became one of the world’s top 20 tramp owners.<br />
“Now we are facing a totally different landscape in the<br />
shipping industry,” he says, and he readily admits that the<br />
company must adapt to the changed environment.<br />
GerMAny<br />
Alexander oetker<br />
Like many others, the company used to rely on the<br />
stream of capital from KG funds to finance its growth, but<br />
Mr Schulte does not expect this source of funding to return<br />
in the near future.<br />
Newbuilding orders are no longer the order of the day for<br />
Reederei Thomas Schulte. Instead, the company is seeking<br />
other ways to secure future growth. “At the moment, we want<br />
to focus on third-party management as an integrated asset<br />
manager,” he says. Possible clients could be banks seeking<br />
partners for ships that they have ended up owning.<br />
Prior to taking over his father’s company, Mr Schulte worked<br />
in the shipping industry in several companies in New York,<br />
Hong Kong and Cyprus. Before that he did an apprenticeship<br />
at Hamburg owner August Bolten. “After the first year, it was<br />
clear that I would remain in the industry,” he says. Mr Schulte<br />
has one six-year-old daughter. But there is no rush for the next<br />
generation to become involved in the company. “I want to do<br />
this for 30 more years,” he says.<br />
His uncle Heinrich Schulte has seven children, two sons<br />
and five daughters. So, there is a lot of potential to keep his<br />
company in family hands.<br />
oetker heir follows in grandfather’s footsteps<br />
Alexander Oetker is building his own fleet at AO Shipping<br />
THE connection between Germany’s food industry dynasty<br />
Oetker and the shipping industry is not always obvious<br />
because the Oetker name does not appear in the daily business<br />
of its affiliate Hamburg Süd.<br />
But shipping has been part of the Oetker family business for<br />
four generations, ever since Richard Kaselowsky, stepfather<br />
of Rudolf August Oetker who was the grandson of the group<br />
founder, acquired shares in Hamburg Süd in the 1930s. As a<br />
result of the share purchase, Rudolf August Oetker got a seat<br />
on the supervisory board of the liner company. Oetker then<br />
expanded its stake to 49% and later acquired all the shares.<br />
Reportedly, Rudolf August Oetker was so enthusiastic<br />
about the prospects for the South America trades that he<br />
wanted Hamburg Süd to engage in a major fleet expansion<br />
immediately. However, he was thwarted by cautious bankers.<br />
GerMAny<br />
Still convinced that it was just the right <strong>time</strong> for newbuildings,<br />
he set up his own shipping company, RAO, which is today the<br />
tramp arm of the Hamburg Süd group.<br />
Established Hamburg owners derogatively called the first<br />
RAO ships the “baking powder fleet”, as the product once laid<br />
the foundation for the Oetker conglomerate.<br />
His grandson Alexander seems to be heading in the same<br />
direction. He initially worked for Hamburg Süd, but then set<br />
up his own shipping company before he was 30 years old,<br />
“for the sake of freedom”, observers suggest.<br />
Now 37, the nephew of the current Oetker group chairman<br />
Rudolf Oetker, today heads AO Shipping. The name remains<br />
a reminder of Hamburg Süd’s tramp shipping arm, and<br />
the company also has business ties with his family’s major<br />
shipping group.<br />
next generation 2012 19
GerMAny<br />
GerMAny<br />
nikolaus Schües<br />
DSr acquisition led to Laeisz change of guard<br />
Nikolaus Schües was brought in to help with bid for former East German company<br />
NIKOLAUS Schües was working at a shipbroker in New York<br />
when his father called in 1993 and asked whether he would<br />
like to join the family-owned company F. Laeisz, a traditional<br />
German shipowner founded in 1824 and well known for its<br />
Flying-P Liner ships.<br />
At that <strong>time</strong>, Mr Schües’ father, Nikolaus W. was preparing his<br />
bid for the former state-owned East German shipping company<br />
Deutsche Seereederei. “My father said he would only do it if I<br />
joined the company,” says Mr Schües, who was 27 years old at<br />
the <strong>time</strong>.<br />
The bid for DSR was successful. “With hindsight, it was ideal<br />
to start the generation change with a big project,” Mr Schües<br />
says. “There were no opportunities for conflict as it was a very<br />
intense period.”<br />
According to Mr Schües, he has had almost no quarrels with<br />
his father, with whom he discusses company strategy regularly.<br />
Laeisz started to grow its fleet in the following years but it<br />
stopped its containership newbuilding programme in 2006, just<br />
before the financial crisis hit the industry.<br />
“This decision was not based on anticipation of the crisis but<br />
more on a gut feeling,” says Mr Schües. However, the company<br />
did not completely withdraw from new building as it ordered<br />
eight car carriers, of which four will be delivered this year.<br />
For the near future, the company will tread cautiously, says<br />
Mr Schües, who stresses that it still has sufficient liquidity<br />
reserves. “You have to be careful that the money you spend on<br />
opportunities is not the money you lack in the end,” he says.<br />
GerMAny<br />
döhle family<br />
Second generation still in control at Peter Döhle<br />
Son Jochen and cousin Christoph are managing owners<br />
PETER Döhle Schiffahrts-KG is a different beast compared<br />
with most other German tramp owners — not only because of<br />
the sheer size of the fleet under its control, but also because of<br />
its business model.<br />
Unlike many of its peers, the company has not relied much<br />
on the KG financing, although it does own a considerable stake<br />
in the KG house HCI. Its strength stems not only from its owned<br />
fleet, but also from the vessels for which it does the exclusive<br />
chartering – and which belong to a number of smaller owners.<br />
20 next generation 2012<br />
Leading Laeisz:<br />
Nikolaus Schües<br />
Laeisz has a fleet of containerships, bulkers, gas tankers<br />
and pure car carriers. Some 30% of the company’s ships fly<br />
the German flag, which is far more than the average of German<br />
shipowners.<br />
Mr Schües has three sisters, who hold a stake in Laeisz,<br />
but who do not work for the company. His three children are<br />
between eight and 12 years old. “We will see whether they want<br />
to join the company one day or are suited for it,” says Mr Schües,<br />
who does not want to put any pressure on them.<br />
He adds that his brother-in-law, Jan-Wilhelm Schuchmann of<br />
tug operator Bugsier Reederei also has children. “We have a lot<br />
of potential successors,” Mr Schües adds.<br />
The company was founded in 1956 by Peter Döhle and Robert<br />
Bornhofen under the name of Robert Bornhofen, but Peter<br />
Döhle seized sole control in 1961 and renamed it after himself.<br />
Today the company is headed Peter Döhle’s son Jochen and his<br />
cousin Christoph Döhle. Both are managing owners.<br />
There is potential for keeping the company in the family’s<br />
hands: Jochen Döhle has two sons of which one is already<br />
actively working in the industry. Christoph Döhle has two<br />
daughters.
GerMAny<br />
Hinneberg family<br />
Hinneberg family offers<br />
the personal touch<br />
Tightknit team at Hamburg shipbroker<br />
HINNEBERG is not exactly a household name in shipping<br />
circles. Yet for some of the most powerful shipowners in the<br />
business, the Hamburg shipbroker Walter J Hinneberg is<br />
second to none. For the past 60 years, this discreet firm has<br />
been at the heart of newbuilding negotiations, concentrating<br />
in particular on the containership sector.<br />
The walls of the modest-sized offices on the Ballindamm are<br />
lined with hundreds of photos of ships representing just some of<br />
those whose order, sale or purchase they have handled. Yet the<br />
firm manages to maintain a remarkably low profile, undoubtedly<br />
helped by the fact that the entire workforce consists of only a<br />
handful of staff – four brokers and two secretaries.<br />
When founder Walter Hinneberg snr died eight years ago,<br />
his twin sons Christian and John Walter continued to run the<br />
business. <strong>On</strong>ly recently have they added some fresh blood,<br />
including Christian’s son Paul who completed a two-year<br />
shipping trainee programme run by Hamburg Süd before<br />
joining the firm in 2009, and Leo Von Ruffin Zisiadis.<br />
Paul Hinneberg says he never felt pushed to become a<br />
broker, but with connections to shipping on both sides of the<br />
family, “it was a natural path to follow”.<br />
His paternal grandfather had a fascinating history. Walter<br />
Hinneberg snr qualified as a chemist before stumbling into<br />
shipping through a friend whose family had lost its fleet during<br />
the Second World War and wanted to rebuild it. Then came a<br />
chance meeting that was to change his life forever.<br />
Mr Hinneberg snr had been attending a reception on board<br />
a tanker ordered by Aristotle <strong>On</strong>assis from the Howaldtswerke<br />
Hamburg shipyard. Afterwards, he offered a lift to the head<br />
of Howaldtswerke Kiel, who was keen to build up his city’s<br />
shipbuilding industry. And that was the start of a shipbroking<br />
firm that has gone from strength to strength ever since.<br />
While Germany’s shipbuilding activities may have waned,<br />
the Hinnebergs forged close links with South Korean shipyards<br />
as shipowners began to place orders in Asia rather than Europe.<br />
Walter J Hinneberg remained active in the business until he<br />
died in 2004, with his children maintaining the trust and loyalty<br />
of those who had worked with their father over the years.<br />
And now the third generation is moving into a business that<br />
has played a pivotal role in the growth of container shipping<br />
but has managed to retain the personal touch that only a small<br />
family unit can genuinely provide.<br />
Paul Hinneberg believes the firm has flourished by focusing<br />
on a few clients rather than trying to do everything.<br />
And while family connections will open doors, his challenge<br />
now is to establish a client base of his own.<br />
GerMAny<br />
Jan Meyer<br />
Seventh<br />
generation steps<br />
up at Meyer Werft<br />
Jan Meyer takes top management role<br />
GerMAny<br />
Meyer Werft managing directors:<br />
Jan Meyer, Bernard Meyer and<br />
Lambert Kruse<br />
THE German shipbuilding industry has been decimated<br />
over past decades but one family-owned yard in Papenburg,<br />
far away from the North Sea coast, has resisted this negative<br />
trend. Today, Meyer Werft focuses on cruiseships and has<br />
become the most well-known shipbuilder in Germany and<br />
yard’s management team has recently been boosted with<br />
the addition of another Meyer family member.<br />
Since 1982, Bernard Meyer has been the public face of<br />
the yard, which was set up in 1795. Thirty years later, his<br />
son Jan, one of the entrepreneur’s five children, has been<br />
appointed a managing director. The 35-year-old has worked<br />
for the family company since 2008, most recently heading<br />
the technical offices responsible for the construction of<br />
cruiseships.<br />
Prior to joining Meyer Werft, Jan Meyer completed his<br />
masters studies in naval architecture at the Massachusetts<br />
Institute of Technology in Boston. He then gained experience<br />
working for yards in South Korea and Denmark. He did his<br />
doctorate closer to home at Jacobs University in Bremen.<br />
When the appointment was announced, Meyer Werft<br />
said its “management will be rejuvenated and extended<br />
in order to meet the challenges of the hard international<br />
competition”.<br />
So far, Meyer Werft has coped well with market<br />
challenges. The yard has relocated from the heart of the city<br />
to the outskirts and resisted demands to set up shop closer<br />
to the sea.<br />
Bernard Meyer has certainly made his mark during his<br />
tenure — a mere three years after he took the helm, the yard<br />
delivered its first cruise newbuilding — and all eyes are now<br />
focused on what seventh-generation Jan can deliver.<br />
next generation 2012 21
GerMAny<br />
GerMAny<br />
Von rantzau family<br />
Von rantzau brothers on track to<br />
keep the business in the family<br />
Clan behind John T. Essberger and DAL have several heirs with an interest in shipping<br />
BEING a family-owned company might have spared German<br />
shipping companies John T. Essberger and Deutsche Afrika-<br />
Linien the worst during the past years of crisis. The company,<br />
which is led in the third generation by brothers Eberhart and<br />
Heinrich von Rantzau, did not join the ordering spree of the<br />
pre-crisis years, which has saved it some serious trouble.<br />
“You are more cautious if it’s your money that you are playing<br />
with,” says Heinrich von Rantzau.<br />
And the future as a company led by family members seems<br />
to be secure as the Von Rantzau brothers have five children<br />
between them. While Eberhart’s son and daughter are both<br />
still of school age, his brother Heinrich has three sons and all<br />
three have shipping experience.<br />
Johann Heinrich, the oldest of the three, holds a masters<br />
degree from the London School of Economics. And, says<br />
Heinrich von Rantzau, “he has also discovered his interest<br />
for the shipping industry”. At the moment, Johann Heinrich<br />
is working in the chartering and operations department at<br />
tramp owner giant Peter Döhle.<br />
Georg, 27, has several internships at international<br />
GerMAny<br />
offen family<br />
22 next generation 2012<br />
shipping companies and freight forwarders and brokers on<br />
his curriculum vitae and he holds a certificate as a chartered<br />
shipbroker. He also has a masters degree in shipping and<br />
finance from London’s Cass Business School. At the moment,<br />
he works in the chartering and operations department of<br />
Hamburg tramp owner Leonhardt & Blumberg.<br />
Aged 26, Christian is the youngest. After an apprenticeship<br />
at container line Hamburg Süd, he is currently completing his<br />
MBA in London.<br />
However, it will be some <strong>time</strong> until one or more of the<br />
children takes a leading position in the family companies as<br />
both Eberhart and Heinrich von Rantzau are keen to stay at<br />
the helm for a few more years. “All three have said that they<br />
want to build up a career outside the company first,” stresses<br />
Heinrich von Rantzau.<br />
The group of companies, which was founded in 1924 by<br />
John T. Essberger, the grandfather of Eberhart and Heinrich<br />
von Rantzau, today operates a diversified fleet of more than<br />
30 vessels, which includes chemical tankers, containerships<br />
and bulk carriers.<br />
offen has earmarked joint successors<br />
But German owner has no plans to step down yet<br />
DESPITE the fact that his father was also a shipowner, Claus-<br />
Peter Offen did not inherit a shipping company unlike many<br />
others in the industry. He started out with one ship, which<br />
he bought at an auction in 1971. Now, his company, Reederei<br />
Claus-Peter Offen, is an industry heavyweight.<br />
The next generation will probably not have to tread the<br />
same path. Along with one of his cousins, one of Claus-Peter<br />
Offen’s sons is already managing director in his father’s<br />
company. Both men are meant to take over the company<br />
jointly one day.<br />
In one of his rare interviews, Claus-Peter Offen said that his<br />
company was big and complex and much of its success was<br />
based on his personal network so he believes it is a good idea<br />
to put the future responsibility for managing it on two people<br />
rather than on his son alone.<br />
At the moment, Mr Offen is still holding tightly to the helm<br />
of his company, which is one of the leading providers of<br />
charter containerships in the world. His position is president<br />
and owner and, according to people who know him, he<br />
so enjoys being in the driver’s seat that he is unlikely to<br />
relinquish control any <strong>time</strong> soon.<br />
The company has a fleet more than 100 containerships<br />
between 1,500 teu and 14,000 teu.<br />
A separate company, the Claus-Peter Offen<br />
Tankschiffreederei, or Offen Tankers, is active in the tanker<br />
business.
Moving up at Maersk:<br />
Robert and Johan Uggla<br />
denMArk<br />
Moller family<br />
Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller’s<br />
grandsons rising up the ranks<br />
Johan and Robert Uggla are steadily climbing the<br />
corporate ladder at Denmark’s biggest company<br />
MAERSK Mc-Kinney Moller’s grandsons have managed to<br />
keep a remarkably low profile, despite belonging to one of<br />
the world’s most powerful shipping dynasties.<br />
But when their grandfather died in April at the age of<br />
98, they suddenly found themselves in the spotlight as<br />
speculation began over whether another Moller could one<br />
day lead Denmark’s biggest company.<br />
Mr Moller’s death did not create any internal corporate<br />
upheavals. Michael Pram Rasmussen has been chairman<br />
since 2003 when Mr Moller retired from that position.<br />
He is survived by three daughters, Leise, Kirsten and Ane.<br />
The oldest and youngest are both involved in the business,<br />
with Ane Maersk Mc-Kinney Uggla particularly close to her<br />
late father.<br />
And it is her two sons who are carrying on the family<br />
ScAndinAViA<br />
tradition, while a third grandson, Morten Olufsen, is on<br />
the board of the AP Moller and Chastine Mc-Kinney Møller<br />
Foundation.<br />
While Mr Moller was alive, it was relatively easy for Johan<br />
and Robert Uggla to work their way up the corporate ladder<br />
without attracting too much attention, helped by their<br />
Swedish surname.<br />
While almost an iconic figure, Mr Moller had kept his<br />
distance from the press while his three daughters also<br />
preferred to stay in the background.<br />
But in this media age, the next generation will find it<br />
much harder avoid attention, particularly as they move into<br />
more high-profile jobs.<br />
Early last year, Johan Uggla was appointed managing<br />
director of APM Terminals-Cargo Service in Aarhus, which<br />
next generation 2012 23
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handles more than half Denmark’s container volumes. His<br />
younger brother Robert recently took over as chief executive<br />
of Svitzer, AP Moller-Maersk’s harbour towage and salvage<br />
subsidiary.<br />
Both are said to be down-to-earth, personable, and<br />
approachable, with neither expecting special treatment<br />
despite their family connections. If they are being quietly<br />
fast-tracked up the corporate ladder, it is being done in a<br />
way that has not caused any apparent resentment from work<br />
colleagues.<br />
Both are getting to know various parts of the business,<br />
although their career paths have taken quite different routes.<br />
Johan Uggla, who is 35, has focused on the ports<br />
division, spending <strong>time</strong> most recently in Brazil as project<br />
implementation manager for an APM Terminals facility in<br />
Itajai, before his move to Aarhus.<br />
He is “unflappable” and “easy to talk to”, say associates.<br />
He understands the need to live up to the high standards set<br />
by his grandfather, but does not pull rank.<br />
Younger brother Robert, who had a spell with an<br />
investment bank before joining AP Moller-Maersk, has been<br />
more involved in financial matters, working for Maersk<br />
Line initially where he was part of the team responsible for<br />
managing the takeover of P&O Nedlloyd. He moved on to be<br />
country manager in Dubai.<br />
norwAy<br />
kathrine and cecilie Fredriksen<br />
Fredriksen twins being taken onboard<br />
Kathrine and Cecilie both hold directorships at many Fredriksen companies<br />
THEY appear high up on most lists of offspring of<br />
billionaires, the more lurid of these lists placing them just<br />
below Paris and Nikki Hilton as the “hottest heiresses of big<br />
fortunes”.<br />
But unlike the ubiquitous party animal Hilton sisters,<br />
you’re not likely to read about the antics of the 27-year-old<br />
Fredriksen twins on the front pages of the tabloid press.<br />
Instead of blurred paparazzi shots of them falling out of<br />
taxis at the end of the night, images of the Norwegian pair<br />
tend to be tightly choreographed press shots of them in the<br />
boardroom, glaring intently into the lens, or either side of<br />
their billionaire shipping tycoon father John Fredriksen<br />
at an international shipping conference, as if they were<br />
protecting him from the demands and attentions of the<br />
industry.<br />
Of course, that is not to say they eschew glamour – far<br />
from it. Both sisters exude wealth and privilege, standing<br />
out in an industry that tends to be dominated by middleaged<br />
men who would probably not know a Louboutin heel<br />
if it passed directly under their noses. <strong>On</strong>e unverified story<br />
about Kathrine was that she broke her leg in an accident<br />
Immediately prior to his new job at Svitzer, he was<br />
managing director of Broström and in charge of the<br />
integration into Maersk Tankers. At Svitzer, which has a<br />
fleet of more than 500 vessels, he will head up a workforce<br />
of 4,500 people.<br />
Those who have worked with Robert Uggla describe him<br />
as very bright, with a relaxed, easy-going manner and the<br />
charm of his grandfather.<br />
“He is highly intelligent, very articulate, and has a nice<br />
air about him,” says one former colleague<br />
But there are no guarantees that either one will eventually<br />
rise to the top of AP Moller-Maersk, the business that dates<br />
back to 1904 when their great-grandfather Arnold Peter<br />
Moller set up the Steamship Company Svendborg.<br />
The group has been transformed in recent years as it<br />
adapts to changing <strong>time</strong>s. The appointment of an outsider,<br />
former Carlsberg boss Nils Andersen, as group chief<br />
executive a few years ago suggested that Moller family<br />
members will not automatically command the most senior<br />
jobs in future, regardless of their heritage.<br />
“It is not a definite,” says one ex-Maersk executive.<br />
Whoever is appointed chief executive or group chairman<br />
in future will have to have been selected on merit, and<br />
not because of their parentage, say those who know the<br />
company well.<br />
In the front line:<br />
the Fredriksen twins<br />
ScAndinAViA<br />
next generation 2012 25
ScAndinAViA<br />
and had to use crutches, which she then decorated with<br />
Swarovski crystals.<br />
And therein lies the rub when it comes to the Fredriksen<br />
twins’ public image. For every compliment you read<br />
posted by bloggers and industry commentators about their<br />
dedication to business and their deserving success, there<br />
are two spite-fuelled comments referring to parasitic, Eurotrash<br />
offspring of billionaires, the fortunate beneficiaries<br />
of nepotism. <strong>On</strong>e wonders if such vitriol would exist if they<br />
were young male heirs to the Fredriksen fortune.<br />
What is certain is that Mr Fredriksen is keen that they<br />
earn their eventual places at the top of the group, ensuring<br />
that they learn the shipping and energy industry intimately<br />
by taking up a number of varied roles across the Fredriksen<br />
empire.<br />
For instance, Kathrine, having graduated from the<br />
European Business School in London, has been a board<br />
member of oil trading company Arcadia Petroleum since<br />
2008. She also sits on the board of offshore company<br />
Seadrill, Independent Tankers and Golar LNG. She decided<br />
not too stand for re-election to the board of tanker company<br />
uS norwAy<br />
Grieg family<br />
green initiatives reign at grieg<br />
THE Bergen-based Grieg family is as much about the current<br />
generation and the next generation.<br />
The fourth-generation siblings took over the reins of the<br />
company in 1999 with Per Grieg Jr, Elisabeth, Camilla and<br />
Elna-Kathrine taking leading roles in the group. Elna-Kathrine<br />
is chair of Grieg Maturitas.<br />
They set up the Grieg Foundation in 2002. The foundation<br />
owns 25% of the Grieg Group of companies and invests its<br />
income into charitable and ethical needs. The remaining 75%<br />
of the Grieg Group remains in the hands of the family through<br />
their holding company Grieg Maturitas.<br />
In Bergen, where the 127-year-old family group is based,<br />
and elsewhere in Norway, the family name is synonymous with<br />
ethical behaviour as much as its musical associations.<br />
Bribery is forbidden to such a point that even a packet of<br />
cigarettes to sweeten a port agent or official is prohibited, and<br />
the group’s shipping business has launched Grieg Green, a bid<br />
to help owners recycle ships in a sound way.<br />
The Grieg group of companies is famous for its shipping<br />
activities, but there is much more to the organisation. In<br />
addition to Grieg Shipping, there is the broker division,<br />
Joachim Grieg & Co, perhaps one of the older parts of the<br />
group. The Grieg Group also consists of a logistics company,<br />
an investment company and Maris, developer of navigation<br />
equipment.<br />
Frontline in 2010, leaving the way open for her sister to take<br />
up the role.<br />
Cecilie, a graduate from London Metropolitan University<br />
in business and Spanish, has an equally full CV, with a place<br />
on the board of Frontline, Aktiv Kapital, Frontline, Seawell,<br />
Northern Offshore, Ship Finance International, and bulkcarrying<br />
company Golden Ocean.<br />
There is no guarantee that the Fredriksen sisters will<br />
eventually head up the family business and take over<br />
executive and chairperson roles when John Fredriksen<br />
decides to hang up his boots. Judging by a recent interview<br />
in which he expressed his enthusiasm for buying more<br />
product tankers, that could be a long <strong>time</strong> in the future<br />
anyway. He also clearly has big plans for the group’s LNG<br />
division and appears to be genuinely excited about the<br />
success of offshore company Seadrill in such a short period<br />
of <strong>time</strong>.<br />
Big Wolf, as he is some<strong>time</strong>s referred to, is clearly set to<br />
stay in shipping for some <strong>time</strong> to come, but his cubs are<br />
more than making their presence felt, and are looking pretty<br />
good in the process.<br />
Fourth-generation siblings took over the reins of the company in 1999<br />
26 next generation 2012<br />
Family foundations:<br />
Elisabeth and Camilla Grieg<br />
Outside the shipping sphere, Grieg Group also owns half of a<br />
fish group, Grieg Seafood and 40% of a wind farm installation<br />
group, NorWind Installer.<br />
Sisters Elisabeth and Camilla run the shipping division, both<br />
attracting media attention, and national awards. Elisabeth<br />
became the 41st and first female president of the Norwegian<br />
Shipowners’ Association in 2008, joking once that she would<br />
like to pull down the dusty sombre portraits of the former male<br />
incumbents over the last century.
norwAy<br />
Höegh family<br />
Driving change at Höegh<br />
Cousins have restructured car carrier and LNG businesses<br />
IT says something either about Norwegian society, or the<br />
Höegh family, that one of them walks to work every day.<br />
The Höegh family is a very reclusive one by all accounts,<br />
taking a completely different approach to ownership to many<br />
other families running businesses. For them standing in front<br />
of the camera is something best left to the management.<br />
Cousins Leif and Morten Höegh took over the family<br />
business in 2003 and promptly brought all the company’s<br />
outstanding shares and delisted it from the Oslo Exchange.<br />
They then restructured it into two main businesses —<br />
Höegh Autoliners, the car carrier business that was originally<br />
a joint venture with Uglands from 1970 to 2000, and Höegh<br />
LNG. Lief is chairman of Höegh Autoliners, while Morton<br />
uS norwAy<br />
thomas wilhelmsen<br />
all’s well at Wilhelmsen<br />
Thomas Wilhelmsen has earned his stripes at the Norwegian company<br />
THOMAS Wilhelmsen cares about his staff, and the<br />
continuation of the company’s good name. Run a a quiet<br />
straw poll canvas of people in Oslo of what they think of the<br />
Wilhelmsen name and brand and one gets the feeling that all<br />
is well in the Wilh. Wilhelmsen camp.<br />
Mr Wilhelmsen took control of the family-controlled, but<br />
Oslo-listed business in the middle of the economic storm two<br />
years ago, and he has done his best to remain upbeat and in<br />
control. He holds two interlinked positions. He is chairman<br />
of the board of Wilh. Wilhelmsen ASA, the listed shipping<br />
division, and is group chief executive of Wilh. Wilhelmsen<br />
Holdings, the listed parent group that also owns Wilhelmsen<br />
Mari<strong>time</strong> Services.<br />
Norwegians do not readily care for a silver spoon approach<br />
to family inheritance, and Mr Wilhelmsen has been made to<br />
work his way round the family business, a unique bespoke<br />
family apprenticeship that has meant he does not take the<br />
business for granted. This in turn has earned him some<br />
respect.<br />
Ask Mr Wilhelmsen about his personal interests, and you<br />
will get a short and sharp answer. Ask him about the business<br />
and its developments and you get a clear, well considered<br />
response.<br />
is chairman of Höegh LNG, which was one of the early gas<br />
carrier owners, building some of the first Moss-type tankers<br />
in the early 1970s.<br />
The high investment costs in the liquefied natural gas<br />
market, especially given Höegh’s plans to expand into<br />
floating regasification units in lieu of land-based terminals,<br />
prompted the family business to re-list Höegh LNG on the<br />
Oslo Exchange last year, with a 37% stake in the company<br />
raising $120m.<br />
Höegh Autoliners remains one of the major car carrier<br />
businesses. It is now partly owned by AP Moller-Maersk.<br />
The Danish operator sold its 12 car carriers to the Norwegian<br />
business in return for a 37.5% stake.<br />
Two generations:<br />
Thomas with his<br />
father Wilhelm<br />
ScAndinAViA<br />
The reshaping of the business in 2010 still left the family in<br />
control. The family name has a good standing and while the<br />
relisting may not have raised the volumes hoped for, it did<br />
quite well given the market conditions. A weaker company<br />
would probably not have tried such a scheme.<br />
Mr Wilhelmsen has yet to make a big mark on the family<br />
business, but he has plenty of <strong>time</strong> on his side in which to do<br />
so. The general feeling is that he is a safe pair of hands and<br />
that is more than can be said of many others in the shipping<br />
business.<br />
next generation 2012 27
ScAndinAViA<br />
uS norwAy<br />
Gunvor and tore ulstein<br />
Firm designs on an offshore future<br />
Ulstein siblings have helped reshape shipbuilders’ focus<br />
ULSTEIN is a place, a shipyard and a family name. The<br />
Ulstein siblings Gunvor and Tore have been shaping the<br />
shipbuilder into a specialist designer and have made the<br />
company name renowned through one important and visible<br />
ship design – the X-bow.<br />
Ulsteinvik is a small former fishing village on Norway’s<br />
northwest coastline. The best way to get there from Oslo is<br />
to fly via Ålesund, then take a ferry south. Today, one of the<br />
main reasons for visiting the region is because of its offshore<br />
specialists. Ulsteinvik is just one of these offshore technology<br />
clusters and the Ulstein family is at the heart of it.<br />
Back in 1999, Vickers bought the Ulstein Group, just<br />
months before Vickers itself was targeted by Rolls-Royce.<br />
What Vickers did not want at the <strong>time</strong> was the shipbuilding<br />
norwAy<br />
Lawrence ward odfjell<br />
Family succession order of day at odfjell<br />
Lawrence Ward took chair from his father in 2010<br />
THE Odfjell family name continues with strength in the west<br />
of Norway shipping community. Not only is it continued in<br />
the Oslo-listed Odfjell Group, but can still be found in Odfjell<br />
Drilling and in the family offshoot, Jo Tankers.<br />
Lawrence Ward Odfjell, who was born in 1965, took over the<br />
chair of the chemical tanker and terminal operating Odfjell<br />
Group in 2010, when his father Bernt Daniel Odfjell stepped<br />
down as chair and took a position as a board member under<br />
his son. Mr Odfjell snr had been in the company since 1963.<br />
While his father had been outspoken on a number of issues<br />
facing the chemical tanker business up to his retirement, Mr<br />
Odfjell jnr has taken a more reserved approach to the public<br />
face of the family business, leaving the day-to-day industry<br />
comments to the companies outspoken chief executive Jan<br />
Hammer. Mr Odfjell’s other passion does appear to be wine.<br />
The family owns a vineyard in Chile.<br />
Meanwhile Jo Tankers, launched as a separate business<br />
from a former Odfjell pool in the 1980s, has developed as its<br />
own business away from Odfjell. Johan Odvar Odfjell has been<br />
chairman since 2008 and sole managing director as of 2003<br />
when both Jo Tankers and Odfjell were embroiled in price<br />
fixing allegations in the US. Jo Tankers has been one of the few<br />
to order chemical tankers this year, taking a pair, with options<br />
from a Chinese yard at the start of the year.<br />
28 next generation 2012<br />
division, focusing more on the engineering side of the<br />
business.<br />
The windfall for the Ulstein family, and the mandatory<br />
years when it was barred from building overseas, or<br />
expanding its portfolio, allowed it to focus on Ulstein Verft<br />
and on finding a new niche. This led to the development of<br />
X-bow design, which has become one of the bow designs of<br />
choice for the offshore sector.<br />
Father Idar Ulstein passed way in April this year. But for<br />
many years, the three children – there is another daughter<br />
Ingerid who runs the family investment business Ulsmo –<br />
have been instrumental in crafting a new company with a very<br />
unique identity both in Norway and within the international<br />
ship design and shipbuilding market.<br />
The new order:<br />
Lawrence Ward Odfjell
FrAnce<br />
Saadé family<br />
Saadé offspring stay in the shipping fold<br />
All three children have roles at CMA CGM<br />
CMA CGM is a truly family affair, with chairman and chief<br />
executive Jacques Saadé still very much in charge, but the<br />
next generation holding key positions in the group that now<br />
operates the third-largest container line in the world.<br />
Mr Saadé’s three children all work for the French company,<br />
while his wife Naila is president of the CMA CGM Corporate<br />
Father and son:<br />
Jacques Saadé and<br />
his son Rodolphe<br />
reSt oF euroPe<br />
Foundation, which supports underprivileged children. Also<br />
undoubtedly part of the extended family is Farid Salem, who<br />
helped Mr Saadé found Compagnie Mari<strong>time</strong> d’Affrètement in<br />
1978 and who remains a central figure in the business.<br />
The pair were both born in Beirut, with Mr Saadé running<br />
the business his father had established for 20 years.<br />
next generation 2012 29
But the war in Lebanon eventually persuaded him to move<br />
to Marseilles where the Saadé family has been based ever<br />
since, building up CMA CGM into a group with annual<br />
turnover in excess of $14bn and a fleet of almost 400 ships,<br />
including a series with capacities approaching 14,000 teu.<br />
With Mr Saadé and Mr Salem both in their seventies, the<br />
younger generation is getting ready to take over — although<br />
not quite yet. Like many of his peers who also built up<br />
shipping empires, Mr Saadé has no retirement plans.<br />
Nevertheless he expects his son Rodolphe, who is now 42,<br />
to eventually succeed him, and has made sure he has a good<br />
grounding in the business. And Rodolphe showed at an<br />
early age that he had inherited the entrepreneurial touch of<br />
his father, starting up Dynamic Concept, a company selling<br />
water coolers, while studying for a Bachelor of Commerce<br />
degree at Concordia University in Montreal.<br />
After running that business for a year or so, he joined<br />
CMA in 1994, shortly before the group acquired Compagnie<br />
Générale Mari<strong>time</strong> and formed CMA CGM. He subsequently<br />
worked in New York and Hong Kong before moving back<br />
to head office where he gained experience of all the major<br />
trade lanes. He was put in charge of the line’s transatlantic<br />
and transpacific services in 2000, and later was given<br />
responsibility for developing the north-south trades and<br />
expanding the group’s presence in Africa. In 2008, he<br />
was appointed chairman of the group’s African specialist<br />
Delmas. More recently, Rodolphe Saadé was directly<br />
involved in negotiating a ground-breaking vessel sharing<br />
agreement with Mediterranean Shipping Co covering the<br />
Asia-Europe trades.<br />
When CMA CGM’s cruise yacht Le Ponant was seized four<br />
years ago, he was the one who made contact with Somali<br />
pirates, leading negotiations until the moment when the<br />
boat and its hostages were freed by French armed forces.<br />
His brother Jacques jnr is senior manager in the agencies<br />
department, and also in charge of the group’s real estate<br />
strategy to ensure, wherever possible, that staff work in<br />
premises that are both comfortable and efficient.<br />
“When CMa CgM’s cruise yacht<br />
Le Ponant was seized four years<br />
ago, rodolphe was the one<br />
who made contact with Somali<br />
pirates, leading negotiations until<br />
the moment when the boat and<br />
its hostages were freed by French<br />
armed forces”<br />
Tanya Saadé Zeenny, Mr Saadé’s only daughter, is both<br />
CMA CGM Group general secretary and senior vice-president<br />
of corporate communications, setting up the public relations<br />
department soon after joining CMA in 1995. Since then,<br />
she has focused on promoting the brand and corporate<br />
culture as the group went on to acquire CGM, Delmas, the<br />
Key players at CMA CGM:<br />
Farid Salem, Tanya Saadé<br />
Zeenny and Jacques Saadé jnr<br />
reSt oF euroPe<br />
Australasia’s ANL, and several other lines as it expanded<br />
into a global player.<br />
She was appointed to the board in 2000 and also heads<br />
the group’s environmental committee.<br />
A few months ago, Mrs Saadé Zeenny decided to become<br />
personally involved in the campaign for workplace equality<br />
between men and women in France.<br />
Like virtually every other containership operator,<br />
CMA CGM has had a bumpy ride in recent years, with<br />
the group’s ambitious expansion programme and large<br />
debts leaving the group particularly exposed during the<br />
downturn and subsequent price war. But the Saadé family<br />
has demonstrated on numerous occasions that a business,<br />
particularly a shipping concern, would appear to have a<br />
much better chance of survival and success in the hands<br />
of a united and determined family than one where outside<br />
shareholders with short-term horizons call the shots.<br />
next generation 2012 31
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SwitzerLAnd<br />
Aponte family<br />
aponte lines up successors to take charge<br />
Diego gradually assuming more top-level container<br />
duties while Alexa concentrates on the cruise business<br />
BY the <strong>time</strong> Alexa and Diego Aponte were born, their parents<br />
had already started to build a shipping empire that would<br />
eventually evolve into one of the biggest and most powerful<br />
in the world. There was little question as to what they would<br />
do when they grew up.<br />
Geneva-headquartered Mediterranean Shipping Co is very<br />
much a family business, with Italian-born Gianluigi Aponte<br />
the powerful patriarch still firmly in charge. Although he is<br />
in his early seventies, he has made it crystal clear that he<br />
has no intention of retiring or easing up. Senior container<br />
line executives report directly to him under MSC’s famously<br />
flat management structure.<br />
But there is also no doubt that his son Diego, now 37, is<br />
being groomed to take over the container shipping business<br />
that ranks second only to Maersk Line, while 40-year-old<br />
Alexa concentrates on the cruise line along with her Israeli<br />
mother, and her husband Pierfrancesco Vago who is chief<br />
executive of MSC Crociere.<br />
With his father retaining a tight grip on the container line,<br />
Diego Aponte is responsible for the group’s ports business,<br />
Terminal Investment, the world’s sixth-largest container<br />
terminal operator.<br />
Like their father, Diego and Alexa keep a relatively low<br />
profile. None of the family have biographical details on<br />
MSC’s website. But when MSC formed a vessel-sharing<br />
alliance with CMA CGM late last year, it was Diego Aponte<br />
and his opposite number at CMA CGM, Rodolphe Saadé, who<br />
announced the deal and fielded media questions, rather than<br />
their respective fathers. Both made the point that they were<br />
Family line up:<br />
Gianluigi<br />
Aponte, left, with<br />
his daughter<br />
Alexa and his<br />
son Diego<br />
32 next generation 2012<br />
responsible for negotiating the agreement. That was seen<br />
by some as a signal that the younger Aponte was gradually<br />
taking on more top-level duties.<br />
He had already stepped into the gap left by the un<strong>time</strong>ly<br />
death in early 2010 of Nicola Mastro, one of Mr Aponte Senior’s<br />
inner circle who had helped MSC grow into the dominating<br />
force it is today and had also set up MSC’s terminals division.<br />
Gianluigi Aponte is convinced that family businesses are<br />
by far the best model for shipping.<br />
“I don’t think shipping companies that are quoted on the<br />
stock exchange will ever be successful,” he said recently.<br />
“Shipping needs a lot of dedication, a lot of sacrifice, a lot of<br />
knowledge that you only have if you work every day... and are<br />
responsible 100% for the business.”<br />
It is that commitment and determination that he expects<br />
of his children as they prepare to take on the business that<br />
their father founded with a 2,800 dwt tweendecker in the<br />
early 1970s, and which now includes a fleet of more than 470<br />
containerships of 2.2m teu, cruise vessels, ferries and ports.<br />
Those who know the company and Mr Aponte snr regard<br />
him as one of the sharpest brains in the business, but<br />
someone who is also immensely loyal to his staff and, as<br />
a former sea captain, hugely supportive of his shipboard<br />
personnel.<br />
His children will have to demonstrate that they have the<br />
same depth of industry knowledge while able to command<br />
as much respect as their father who has achieved so much<br />
over the past four decades. Industry insiders say he will be<br />
an incredibly hard act to follow.
Tribute to tradition:<br />
the Ofer family stand in<br />
front of the bust of Sammy<br />
Ofer at London’s National<br />
Mari<strong>time</strong> Museum<br />
uk/ MonAco<br />
ofer family<br />
ofer heirs embrace their shipping legacy<br />
Second and third generation active in the family business<br />
SAMMY Ofer bequeathed more than a shipping empire to<br />
his sons and grandchildren. They also inherited one of the<br />
most iconic names in the industry — a name that continues to<br />
resonate in shipping circles the world over.<br />
Like most shipping families, the Ofer clan prefers to keep a<br />
low profile, giving away as little as possible about its business<br />
interests.<br />
But shipping is in the blood, with both second and<br />
third generation family members deeply involved in the<br />
organisation that Sammy Ofer founded some 40 years ago.<br />
When he died last year, sons Eyal and Idan took over as<br />
principals of Sammy Ofer Group Monaco that encompasses<br />
both London-headquartered Zodiac Mari<strong>time</strong> Agencies and<br />
the affiliated Singapore-based Tanker Pacific.<br />
A few weeks ago, Eyal was named chairman of Zodiac,<br />
which manages and operates a fleet of more than 150 vessels,<br />
including some of the world’s biggest containerships, along<br />
with bulk carriers, chemical tankers, and car carriers, many<br />
of them flagged in the UK.<br />
And now his two sons, Daniel and David, are embarking<br />
on their own careers in shipping, joining the business at a<br />
young age and having learned plenty from their father, uncle<br />
and, of course, famous grandfather.<br />
reSt oF euroPe<br />
Last year, Daniel was appointed managing director of<br />
Zodiac Mari<strong>time</strong>, working directly for the highly-respected<br />
Capt Rami Zingher who heads up the firm’s large London team<br />
of ship brokers, fleet managers and other shipping personnel.<br />
Daniel joined Zodiac after studying for a bachelor’s degree<br />
at Dartmouth University in the US and graduating with an<br />
MBA from the London Business School. He is also on the<br />
board of directors of the Standard P&I Club.<br />
Younger brother David studied at Dartmouth as well, and<br />
then went on to Columbia University in New York where he<br />
gained an MBA. He subsequently spent several years with<br />
Goldman Sachs before joining the business focusing on<br />
tankers in Asia.<br />
In the lobby of Zodiac’s smart new offices in London’s West<br />
End are some splendid ship models. But in one corner is a<br />
reminder of the man who founded one of the industry’s great<br />
shipping dynasties – a bronze bust of Sammy Ofer.<br />
And his children and grandchildren have pledged to<br />
ensure that the hugely successful business he developed<br />
from such small beginnings “will continue unchanged”,<br />
with the promise to “maintain his tradition of hard work and<br />
dedication”, as they protect and build upon the legacy he left<br />
behind.<br />
next generation 2012 33
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MonAco<br />
John Michael radziwill<br />
Well-connected radziwill rates family structures<br />
CTM chief executive John Michael Radziwill enjoys close ties with his Greek relations<br />
JOHN Michael Radziwill had just turned 30 when he was<br />
appointed chief executive of bulk carrier owner and operator<br />
CTM a couple of years ago, and he has had to contend with<br />
some torrid trade conditions since then.<br />
However, he was well prepared.<br />
With rates under severe pressure, one of his top priorities<br />
has been to reduce Monaco-based CTM’s exposure to a falling<br />
dry bulk market in the short term while covering much of the<br />
company’s long-term exposure via <strong>time</strong> charter contracts.<br />
At the same <strong>time</strong>, his aim was to “cautiously expand our<br />
activities” through, for example, ship acquisitions or long-term<br />
charters with purchase options.<br />
But before being thrown into the deep end at a such<br />
a particularly difficult <strong>time</strong> for the shipping markets, Mr<br />
Radziwill already had plenty of experience under his belt,<br />
having spent <strong>time</strong> at sea, and even buying and selling some<br />
ships of his own while still in his twenties.<br />
What helped were his family connections. His maternal<br />
grandfather was the late John M Carras, one of the socalled<br />
Golden Greeks, while Mr Radziwill is first cousin of<br />
another prominent Greek shipping magnate, Ceres Shipping<br />
shareholder Peter Livanos.<br />
<strong>On</strong> his father’s side of the family, Lee Radziwill, sister of<br />
the late Jacqueline Kennedy who wed Aristotle <strong>On</strong>assis, was<br />
married to his grandfather.<br />
Mr Radziwill served as a deck cadet and apprentice engineer<br />
on his grandfather’s tankers and bulk carriers during semester<br />
breaks from Brown University in the US, where he studied<br />
economics.<br />
BeLGiuM<br />
Alexander Saverys<br />
Saverys recipe for a shipping career<br />
When your family eats and breathes shipping, you cannot<br />
help but be intrigued by the industry, says Alexander Saverys<br />
FOR Alexander Saverys, the 34-year-old founder and<br />
managing director of Delphis, a Belgium-based multimodal<br />
company, going into the shipping industry was simply a<br />
logical decision.<br />
“When your family eats and breathes shipping every day,<br />
34 next generation 2012<br />
Family ties:<br />
John Michael Radiziwill<br />
After graduating, he spent a year working in technical<br />
operations at related company Ceres Hellenic, and another 12<br />
months at South Korean shipyard Samsung Heavy Industries,<br />
which culminated with him serving on one of the ships whose<br />
construction he oversaw — the 2004-built suezmax Cap Pierre.<br />
At CTM, part of the Ceres Shipping group, he has continued<br />
to develop logistics activities while the company also has a<br />
fully fledged inhouse technical management department for<br />
its dry cargo activities. The fleet CTM manages now numbers<br />
65 ships.<br />
Mr Radziwill has also worked alongside his brother Philip<br />
in the LNG sector through GasLog, which recently completed a<br />
successful initial public offering.<br />
Not surprisingly, the CTM chief executive concurs with the<br />
view that the family model still works in shipping.<br />
“We are very happy with ours,” he says.<br />
going from the shipbuilding stage to the naming ceremonies<br />
and visiting ships calling in ports, you end up being<br />
intrigued by the industry,” he says. “I was never actively<br />
pushed into shipping, it is just probably in my DNA.”<br />
The Saverys family has extensive involvement in the
shipping industry. His father Marc is chairman, chief<br />
executive and major shareholder of holding company<br />
CMB, owner of the bulk carrier operator Bocimar and the<br />
listed very large crude carrier specialist Euronav, while his<br />
uncle Nicholas is chief executive at Exmar, a shipowner<br />
specialising in gas carriers.<br />
But how easy is it for subsequent generations to make<br />
their mark? “It’s never easy,” says Mr Saverys, “but then<br />
that can be said about any job. Coming from a shipping<br />
family has pros and cons. The obvious advantages are the<br />
well-established network, good name and business culture<br />
that has proven successful throughout the years. The<br />
disadvantages are the prejudices and high expectations.”<br />
Despite the family’s extensive shipping interests, it seems<br />
that Mr Saverys has been determined to achieve success in<br />
his own right by going into a completely different sector.<br />
He set up Delphis in 2004, which bought feeder operator<br />
Team Lines from Finnlines in 2006. Other acquisitions have<br />
included Portlink and the Sjursoya Container Terminal.<br />
However, Mr Saverys has chosen to retain close family<br />
ties. He is a director of CMB and his father Marc has a<br />
seat on the Delphis board with one of the advantages of<br />
working alongside family members being “easy and fast<br />
communication”, he says.<br />
Mr Saverys has degrees in law from the University of<br />
Leuven and Complutense Madrid and an MBA from the<br />
Fachhochschule für Wirtschaft in Berlin. He is also a director<br />
itALy<br />
Grimaldi family<br />
rolling on the family business<br />
Guido Grimaldi is one member of the third generation at the Italian ro-ro specialist<br />
WHEN brought up in a shipping family and expected to take<br />
over the reins, it is imperative that you learn about the whole<br />
business. That means both office work and <strong>time</strong> at sea.<br />
When Guido Grimaldi was just 16, his namesake grandfather<br />
sent him away for three or four weeks during the summer<br />
holidays onboard the family’s vessels, a tradition that was<br />
repeated until he left school.<br />
With only the master of the vessel aware that Guido was a<br />
Grimaldi, he was treated like everyone else. That gave him great<br />
insight into the Grimaldi Group’s operations, which span car<br />
and truck carriers, con-ros and passenger ferries, making it one<br />
of the largest fully integrated multinational logistics group.<br />
After attending university in Naples, he studied for an MBA<br />
in logistics in Frankfurt, before joining the family business in<br />
2005 where he has worked his way up to become commercial<br />
manager of shortsea lines.<br />
“You grow in our company if you do a good job and if you<br />
work hard. I am the first one in the office and the last one out,”<br />
he says.<br />
Alexander Saverys:<br />
shipping is in my DNA<br />
reSt oF euroPe<br />
of the Belgian Shipowners’ Association. He is married and<br />
the father of three young sons, aged five, three and one.<br />
Does he want his children to continue in the business? “I just<br />
want them to be happy, whether in shipping or elsewhere.”<br />
Guido, now 29, praises the close working and personal<br />
relationship he has with father Emanuele and his uncle<br />
Gianluca, who head the group’s activities along with their<br />
brother-in-law Diego Pachella.<br />
He cites as an example a new line set up earlier this year<br />
between Salerno and Malta that was launched a week after he<br />
discussed the idea with his father over lunch. They simply came<br />
back to the office, had a meeting with relevant managers and the<br />
trade lane was implemented.<br />
“It’s amazing how fast we are but we have the flexibility that<br />
not all companies have,” he says.<br />
Certainly, a large fleet helps — but understanding your<br />
customer base is vital and the younger generation is always<br />
asked to bring fresh ideas to the table.<br />
“Some<strong>time</strong>s problems start when there is conflict with<br />
different generations but the best thing about our company is<br />
that my father and my uncle will always listen to us about our<br />
ideas and projects. We have to be very innovative and come up<br />
with concrete business plans,” he says.<br />
next generation 2012 35
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“And we have a very good relationship between the cousins<br />
as well, which is very important. We talk a lot and this is really<br />
the strength of the company. The fact that as a family we are very<br />
close adds value.”<br />
“We have a very good<br />
relationship between the cousins<br />
as well, which is very important.<br />
We talk a lot and this is really the<br />
strength of the company. the<br />
fact that as a family we are very<br />
close adds value”<br />
Of the nine cousins, a handful work within the family<br />
company. This includes Guido’s younger brother Eugenio, 26,<br />
who started with the company around the beginning of the year<br />
and is working closely with him in the commercial department.<br />
There is also another Guido in the family business, the<br />
son of Gianluca, who is working within the commercial<br />
36 next generation 2012<br />
Guido Grimaldi:<br />
has found satisfaction<br />
in shipping<br />
department of the deepsea business, which is headquartered<br />
in London.<br />
Another cousin Mario also works for the company, taking<br />
care of the crew and also customer satisfaction onboard<br />
vessels, having joined around 2007.<br />
But Guido stresses that none of the third generation has<br />
been pushed into the business and refers as an example to<br />
Mario’s sister who is a teacher. “It is very important she is<br />
doing something she likes. If we want to work in the company<br />
we have to do very well,” he says.<br />
Guido now spends a lot of his <strong>time</strong> in Spain, split between<br />
Barcelona, Valencia and Madrid where the company has<br />
offices generating cargo. As commercial manager, he<br />
estimates he takes around 300-350 flights a year. He will be<br />
spending more <strong>time</strong> in Barcelona now that the group has won<br />
a concession to build a new terminal in the Spanish port, of<br />
which he will be a member of the board.<br />
First established in 1947, the Grimaldi Group has grown<br />
to encompass shipping, terminal and logistics operations<br />
with offices in 25 countries, and has a fleet of around 100<br />
vessels spread across many quality brands such as Atlantic<br />
Container Lines, Malta Motorways of the Sea, Minoan Lines<br />
and Finnlines.
itALy<br />
Bottiglieri family<br />
Bottiglieri sisters shine in shipping<br />
Three daughters of Italian owner fly the flag for women in the mari<strong>time</strong> industry<br />
HAVING experienced two shipping downturns by the age of 34<br />
is quite an impressive feat, but Mariella Bottiglieri remembers<br />
that first experience as if it was yesterday.<br />
During the 1980s crisis at the tender age of five years, the<br />
eldest daughter of Italy’s Giuseppe Bottiglieri recalls seeing<br />
laid-up ships filling Mediterranean ports.<br />
“I remember saying to my father ‘Oh daddy, that’s nice’ and<br />
he said to me, ‘That’s not nice darling, that’s when it is not<br />
nice’,” she says. “Of course back then I didn’t understand why<br />
it was not nice.”<br />
Along with her two younger sisters — Alessandra, 30, and<br />
Manuela, 26 — Mariella followed her father Giuseppe onto his<br />
Shipping sisters:<br />
Mariella, Manuela and<br />
Alessandra Bottiglieri<br />
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ships every summer holiday when school finished. Manuela<br />
even celebrated her first birthday on board one of the family<br />
vessels.<br />
Indeed the Giuseppe Bottiglieri Shipping website – for the<br />
family company that operates a fleet of modern post-panamax<br />
bulk carriers and medium range product chemical tankers –<br />
has a photo gallery detailing not only the daughters growing<br />
up with the business, but the history of a shipping dynasty<br />
begun in 1850.<br />
The three daughters represent the sixth generation of<br />
Bottiglieris in shipping. They each specialise in different areas of<br />
the family company, playing to their own strengths and interests.<br />
next generation 2012 37
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Mariella is a managing director and chartering manager,<br />
overseeing the tanker fleet. After studying economics at<br />
university in Naples, she moved to London as a trainee for<br />
shipbroker Clarksons.<br />
“I believe in having a significant experience outside the<br />
boundaries of the family business; it is important to be an<br />
employee before being an employer,” she says.<br />
After a few months as a trainee she was offered a permanent<br />
job brokering product tankers, and stayed for almost three<br />
years. This is also where she met her husband Joe Green, who<br />
was her boss and is still a director of Clarksons’ London tanker<br />
department. She moved back to Italy and joined the family<br />
company in 2004 so has seen the boom and the bust of the<br />
noughties.<br />
“at weekends or even eating your<br />
turkey at Christmas, you end up<br />
talking about shipping”<br />
Alessandra followed a similar path and studied economics<br />
at university before joining the business at the same <strong>time</strong><br />
as Mariella; having started in the operations team she now<br />
works in the financial department and is also a managing<br />
director. Her husband Raffaele Borriello works in the dry cargo<br />
chartering department of the business as well.<br />
In contrast to her sisters, Manuela studied law at university<br />
in Rome and now works in the company’s legal department,<br />
while her husband Giorgio Avino works in the dry cargo<br />
chartering department of their uncle’s business – Michele<br />
Bottiglieri Armatore.<br />
“This is a family business but when I talk about family I<br />
don’t just mean my parents and sisters, it’s everybody. We have<br />
people who have been working here for more than 30 years,<br />
itALy<br />
d’Amico family<br />
which makes the family feeling even stronger,” Mariella says.<br />
“The secret is to get on well and not have arguments<br />
within the family. At weekends or even eating your turkey at<br />
Christmas, you end up talking about shipping. This is a good<br />
thing but also a bad thing in the terms that you never really<br />
stop – it’s a 24-hour job.”<br />
Between them, the three daughters have five young children<br />
ranging from seven months to three years and while childcare<br />
may be widespread across other parts of Europe, Giuseppe<br />
Bottiglieri Shipping in Naples has introduced an in-office<br />
nursery.<br />
“Since my sisters and I became mothers, we understand the<br />
problem coping – trying to match your personal life and your<br />
job,” says Mariella.<br />
“It started as a personal need but then we understood that<br />
many women have this problem so it is open to any woman in<br />
the office. Whether it’s me or any other woman in the office, as<br />
a mother they can go in the nursery and see what their children<br />
are doing. This gives you the possibility to stay, with peace of<br />
mind. And then you work better if you don’t have to worry<br />
about your child.”<br />
For now the children follow their mothers wherever they<br />
go, travelling with them on business trips, and have already<br />
become used to the international reach of the shipping<br />
industry.<br />
But do they want them to follow in the family footsteps?<br />
“The strength of any family business is staying together. I<br />
hope that all five of them have the qualities and should they<br />
[want to], they are welcome,” Mariella says.<br />
The process of handing down the business from one<br />
generation to the next must be handled with care though, even<br />
if takes a couple of decades.<br />
“You don’t want to just change the top of management — it<br />
takes a long <strong>time</strong> to get the qualifications and experience. A<br />
surname is something we all have as heritage but you have to<br />
show that you can do the job.”<br />
D’amico family builds on mari<strong>time</strong> heritage<br />
Latest generation entering the family business<br />
LIKE many Italian shipping companies, the roots of d’Amico<br />
Società di Navigazione go back to a group of brothers working<br />
together in the mari<strong>time</strong> industry. Today their grandchildren<br />
are also following the same route.<br />
The company was set up in the 1950s in the crude tanker<br />
sector and today spans product tankers, dry bulk, containers and<br />
shipping services. Cousins Paolo d’Amico, the group’s president,<br />
and Cesare d’Amico, the chief executive, descend from brothers<br />
Ciro and Salvatore, with the latter’s namesake one of the most<br />
active next generation members in the business today.<br />
38 next generation 2012<br />
The offspring of Paolo, who is also the head of the Italian<br />
shipowners’ association Confitarma, are all understood to be<br />
involved in the mari<strong>time</strong> world. Lorenzo is still at Cass Business<br />
School in London and has yet to join the family business like<br />
his siblings Manuela and Salvatore.<br />
The d’Amico website gives little biographical detail but we<br />
can learn from business networking sites such as LinkedIn that<br />
Salvatore has been fleet manager at d’Amico Dry for over two<br />
years having been marine supervising manager for the wider<br />
group since April 2008.
turkey<br />
yildirim family<br />
Yildirim brothers will look to third generation<br />
‘If family members have talent and know-how they should<br />
remain in the business even if it is listed,’ says Robert Yildirim<br />
TURKEY’S Robert Yildirim suddenly arrived in the wider<br />
consciousness of the shipping industry in 2010, when Yildirim<br />
Group acquired a 20% interest in debt-laden French container<br />
giant CMA CGM.<br />
But he did not arrive out of nowhere, and is himself the product<br />
of a family business, launched by his father Garip Yildirim in 1963<br />
as a construction material trading company. Today, it is one of<br />
the fastest-growing Turkish industrial groups, with headquarters<br />
in Istanbul.<br />
Mr Yildirim senior is now retired, and the concern is currently<br />
run by his three sons. Robert, born in 1960, holds the job of chief<br />
executive and arguably enjoys a higher profile than his brothers.<br />
Of the others, Ali Riza, born in 1957, acts as chairman, while<br />
Mehmet, born in 1963, has a seat on the board.<br />
Yildirim Group is active in many spheres. <strong>On</strong> the shipping side,<br />
Yilmar Shipping and Trading was launched in 2000 to handle<br />
the logistics needs of the wider group by operating as an active<br />
shipping company involved in ownership, shipmanagement,<br />
chartering, agency, shipbroking services and sales and purchase.<br />
It bought Marmara Shipyard a few years ago, expressly to build<br />
vessels for its own account. In addition, it operates privatised<br />
ports in Turkey, and openly covets terminals elsewhere, recently<br />
gaining control of 50% of Malta Freeport.<br />
In an exclusive interview, Robert Yildirim told Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong> that<br />
he believes private family businesses in shipping can work well<br />
up to a certain size. <strong>On</strong>ce they are worth something like $100m,<br />
they might find it better to be listed. Even then, it is some<strong>time</strong>s<br />
worth retaining family control<br />
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“If they have the talent and the know-how, then the family<br />
should stay in the business even if it is listed, so the majority is<br />
controlled by the family,” hesays.<br />
So what are the succession plans at Yildirim Group? Will<br />
management eventually be entrusted to a third generation?<br />
“We are hoping so. Our next generation is still young. There<br />
are three brothers in the second generation and each of us has<br />
two children, one boy and one girl. The youngest ones are in<br />
high school and the others at university.<br />
“It will take some <strong>time</strong> for them to put their minds to their<br />
work, but it is our wish they come and continue. Some of the<br />
kids want to do something else outside the family business, but<br />
this is an early stage and they can change their mind, after they<br />
see that it is not easy to start up something.”<br />
However, Mr Yildirim admits that it can be difficult for<br />
successors to make their mark, especially in today’s climate<br />
of globalisation and economic turbulence. But if his own<br />
experience is anything to go by, it is not impossible.<br />
“When I started, I had to negotiate with the older generation.<br />
I can see the difficulties, but after you gain experience, these<br />
things disappear. You don’t see the age difference when you<br />
negotiate. But to get used to this, you need to work about 10<br />
years,” he says.<br />
“We are all still children in our father’s eyes, and our children<br />
will still be children in our eyes. This is psychological. I had to<br />
prove to my father that what I did was right and the best result is<br />
the profit. If it creates profit, it is no problem, you are right and<br />
he saw the result.”<br />
Family values:<br />
profits are one<br />
way of proving you<br />
have made the<br />
right decision, says<br />
Robert Yildirim<br />
next generation 2012 39
eSt oF euroPe<br />
turkey<br />
yavuz kalkavan<br />
Looking after your business is as<br />
important as looking after your child<br />
Yavuz Kalkavan of Besiktas hails family culture<br />
STILL in his early thirties, Yavuz Kalkavan is managing<br />
director of Turkey’s family-controlled Besiktas Group, which<br />
is engaged in shipping and shipbuilding as well as banking,<br />
insurance, health services and tourism.<br />
He is married, with a son and a daughter, although at such<br />
a relatively young age, succession planning will obviously not<br />
be first thing on his mind.<br />
But while he is a strong supporter of the family business<br />
concept, he accepts that it might not be right for all enterprises<br />
in all situations.<br />
“We have a very strong<br />
principle. My father<br />
does not take any decision<br />
that i don’t like and the<br />
same definitely goes for me”<br />
“It depends on the capability of the family,” he says. “Modern<br />
shipping has strong requirements from the companies. For this<br />
reason, shipping is a big challenge for all companies including<br />
family companies.<br />
“In our family culture, looking after the business is as<br />
important as looking after your kid. I am very proud to be in<br />
turkey<br />
Sabanci family<br />
Family focus at Yasa Holdings<br />
Sabanci sons have board seats<br />
YASA Holding has only been in existence for 13 years,<br />
during which <strong>time</strong> it has established itself as a leading<br />
Turkish player in a number of sectors.<br />
Its shipping division, Yasa Shipping Industry and<br />
Trading, controls a modern fleet comprising 17 bulk<br />
carriers and nine large tankers, which is reported to<br />
be entirely on <strong>time</strong> charter. The group is also active in<br />
40 next generation 2012<br />
my family business and having the chance to look after the<br />
business.”<br />
Mr Kalkavan says that succession arrangements proceeded<br />
smoothly in his case, as he has enjoyed support from his father,<br />
who extended him full confidence.<br />
“We have a very strong principle. My father does not take<br />
any decision that I don’t like and the same definitely goes for<br />
me.”<br />
Indeed, long-term support from the family is the key to<br />
success, he believes. That said, there will be no pressure on his<br />
own offspring to take over the reins.<br />
“I only wish to see my son and daughter as happy individuals<br />
like me, they are 100% free to try this in shipping or in any<br />
other thing to spend their own lives,” Mr Kalkavan says.<br />
However, he suggests that it might be good for them to have<br />
some experience outside the family business, which he did not<br />
have himself, with a handover once they reach their thirties.<br />
But what about the inevitable differences of opinion that<br />
arise in all businesses? Which generation should get the last<br />
word?<br />
“Younger people are more aggressive and most of the <strong>time</strong><br />
not experienced enough,” he says. “They need good support<br />
next to them, but not heavily on top of them. Both generations<br />
must be equal for the last word; both of them must try for the<br />
agreement.”<br />
construction, aviation, tourism and textiles. Founder<br />
Yalçın Sabanci,aged 69, is the scion of the Sabanci family,<br />
the richest in Turkey, and spent 39 years running its textile<br />
operations before going into business on his own account<br />
in 1999.<br />
Succession is thought to lie with his sons Emirhan and<br />
Ilhan, both of whom sit on the Yasa Holding board.
uk/HonG konG<br />
williams brothers<br />
graig goes to China<br />
Williams brothers helping to build this historic Cardiff<br />
company’s next global phase<br />
CARDIFF-BASED Graig Shipping has made a mark for itself<br />
as a progressive international shipowning and ship services<br />
group, and an approach to business that features innovation<br />
as a defining characteristic.<br />
Graig was one of the first marine groups from outside<br />
China to recognise and deploy the potential of Chinese<br />
shipyards. Graig developed a new design concept for an<br />
energy efficient container feeder vessel in collaboration<br />
with Wärtsilä and DNV. As a start, it has ordered three 2,083<br />
teu vessels from Jin Hai Shipbuilding in China, with an<br />
option for another three more. All told, it plans a fleet of 20<br />
of these ships.<br />
This is a plan with some audacity, but the approach is very<br />
much in the blood. Hugh Williams, born in 1960, has been<br />
chief executive of Graig Shipping since 1993. Chris Williams,<br />
born in 1966, joined the firm in 1999, is now commercial<br />
director. Their father Desmond Williams joined the company<br />
in 1945, and eventually wrote a memoir about the historic<br />
firm. Founder Idwal Williams established the company with<br />
a purchase of a First World War tramp steamer, the SS Graig,<br />
for a tidy £140,000.<br />
“it is important to be competitive<br />
in terms of design and payment<br />
terms, our specifications are<br />
stronger than standard designs at<br />
other Chinese yards”<br />
The China order represents an extension of a business<br />
model pioneered by Graig. The model, which the<br />
company used earlier in its Diamond project to build<br />
handymax carriers in Vietnam, is based on agreement with<br />
shipbuilders to construct an extensive series of ships, with<br />
Graig providing extensive pre-delivery supervision.<br />
Chris Williams, who spent seven years early in his career<br />
working for Fortis Bank in ship financing in Singapore, lent<br />
his financing acumen to the deal, which included support<br />
from the China Exim Bank.<br />
Commenting on the order, Chris Williams emphasised<br />
the company’s hands-on approach. “It is important to be<br />
competitive in terms of design and payment terms,” he said.<br />
“Our specifications are stronger than standard designs at<br />
other Chinese yards.”<br />
Governing Graig’s Asian drive:<br />
Chris, top, and Hugh Williams<br />
ASiA<br />
next generation 2012 41
ASiA<br />
HonG konG<br />
Andy tung<br />
the tung legacy lives on<br />
Andy Tung brings a wealth of experience to the<br />
helm of what many call Asia’s best-run box line<br />
WHEN Andy Tung, 45, takes the helm as chief executive of<br />
Orient Overseas Container Lines on July 1, he will be the third<br />
generation to lead what has now become one of the best-run<br />
companies in shipping.<br />
OOCL, which is the main business of holding company<br />
Hong Kong-listed Orient Overseas (International) Ltd has had<br />
its troubles in the shipping crisis. But it is fair to say that other<br />
than Hapag-Lloyd, OOCL has shown the most resilience to<br />
the market downturn of any major line. OOCL finished 2011<br />
in the black. Mind you, the $83m net profit it posted for the<br />
year was down 90% from 2010, and also weaker than the firsthalf<br />
gain of $143.4m, indicating that second half was lossmaking.<br />
But OOCL was profitable all the same, a testimony to<br />
the company’s discipline in holding down costs, turning away<br />
loss-making cargoes during the 2011 rates war, and in its policy<br />
of diversifying into the intra-Asia trades.<br />
If it was easy, then more lines would have achieved<br />
profitability. But Mr Tung, like his uncle, chairman of OOIL<br />
Tung Chee-chen, or his father, former OOIL chairman and first<br />
post-colonial chief executive of Hong Kong Tung Chee-hwa,<br />
has never regarded shipping or the stewardship of OOCL as<br />
anything but the most serious endeavour. Mr Tung has been<br />
the line’s chief operating officer since 2009 and OOIL executive<br />
director since 2011. After working in management positions at<br />
OOCL between 1993 and 1998, he became chief financial officer<br />
at internet stock trading company Boom.com. He then held<br />
senior management positions at Hong Kong Dragon Airlines<br />
and rejoined OOCL in 2006.<br />
“His uncle CC tung said it best<br />
when told Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong> in 2009,<br />
‘there is nothing better than<br />
working through the down cycle<br />
to get experience.’”<br />
The combination of outside entrepreneurial experience and<br />
deep background in shipping is sound grooming for an heir<br />
apparent. He has had exposure to finance and management<br />
at two Hong Kong self-starting companies, and he knows the<br />
mechanics of a ship operator now as second nature.<br />
He has a legacy to draw on. The Tung family itself has had<br />
a long and complex history of shipping in China. In 1947,<br />
the 10,000 tonne Tien Loong, owned by the family patriarch<br />
CY Tung, was the first all-Chinese ship to cross the Atlantic.<br />
42 next generation 2012<br />
Andy Tung:<br />
will take control<br />
of OOCL in July<br />
Following the communist revolution in 1949, the Tungs moved<br />
from Shanghai to Hong Kong and built their shipping empire<br />
there under British governance. CH Tung was closely involved<br />
with the politics of the handover in 1997 before being tapped as<br />
Hong Kong’s first chief executive under Chinese rule.<br />
The company went through a major restructuring in<br />
the 1980s. Some analysts believe that that trial by fire has<br />
benefitted OOCL’s institutional memory. Under CC Tung,<br />
the company has maintained a strong cash buffer, which<br />
has helped its operations and reputation during the current<br />
downturn. Looking ahead to 2012 and to stewardship of<br />
OOCL into the future, the main focus will be maintaining<br />
the discipline on cost, risk management, diversification and<br />
customer service that has put the company ahead. Andy Tung<br />
looks well prepared. His uncle CC Tung said it best when he<br />
told Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong> in 2009, “There is nothing better than working<br />
through the down cycle to get experience.”
HonG konG<br />
Sabrina chao<br />
Smooth transition at Wah Kwong Shipping<br />
Sabrina Chao has been at the helm since her father suffered from a stroke<br />
LONG groomed to take over her family business, Sabrina Chao<br />
is not just some inexperienced daughter of chairman parachuted<br />
into a key position.<br />
<strong>On</strong> paper, Ms Chao has the educational and professional<br />
background to be a top financial manager anywhere. After<br />
earning a bachelor’s degree in mathematics with management<br />
from the Imperial Colleague University of London in 1996, she<br />
worked for Jardine Fleming and PwC – two prestigious firms in<br />
the financial industry.<br />
In 2002, Wah Kwong Shipping, founded by her grandfather in<br />
the middle of the last century, welcomed her back as a director.<br />
She then was appointed vice-chairman and chief financial officer<br />
in 2007, becoming the heiress apparent to her father, chairman<br />
George Chao.<br />
Ms Chao has been Wah Kwong’s de facto leader after her<br />
father suffered a stroke in late 2010. The transition appears to<br />
be smooth, as Ms Chao generally maintains the company’s riskaverse<br />
business model of leasing out vessels on <strong>time</strong> charter<br />
contracts lasting from one to five years. Wah Kwong, one of Hong<br />
Kong’s largest non-listed shipping lines, has been receiving<br />
SinGAPore<br />
Pacific international Lines<br />
PiL’s staying power<br />
SS Teo has furthered his father’s legacy. Who’s next in line?<br />
PACIFIC International Lines has staying power. So too does the<br />
legendary family that founded it. The company was started by<br />
Teo Woon Tong — also know as YC Chang — in 1967 from a small<br />
storefront on Singapore’s Market Street. At the <strong>time</strong>, its strategy<br />
was highly original. Knowing that he could not compete with<br />
the global carriers, Mr Chang opted to export Chinese goods to<br />
the world. The changes in China eventually catapulted PIL to the<br />
19th largest shipping company in the world.<br />
Son Teo Siong Seng has built on his father’s commercial<br />
acumen, ensuring that the shipping company held its own and<br />
became a big player in the intra-Asia trades, now the world’s<br />
single biggest trade region in terms of volume.<br />
He oversaw the company’s listing of its container unit,<br />
Singamas, on the Hong Kong stock exchange in 1993, a year<br />
after he became managing director of PIL. His father remains<br />
chairman.<br />
SS Teo knew that he would make a career in shipping<br />
from the start, with studies in ocean engineering and naval<br />
Smooth operator:<br />
Sabrina Chao<br />
newbuildings as planned. It now owns a well-balanced fleet of 12<br />
bulk carriers, five tankers and 12 liquefied petroleum gas carriers.<br />
Further purchases of vessels, as well as expansion in property<br />
and environmental business, could be on Ms Chao’s agenda in<br />
the future. The young leader has held firm in shipping’s worst<br />
downturn in decades, and outsiders will be keenly watching how<br />
she performs once the business climate improves.<br />
architecture at Glasgow University before he joined PIL in 1979.<br />
He has also been active in Singapore mari<strong>time</strong> affairs, as<br />
former chairman of the Singapore Mari<strong>time</strong> Institute and<br />
president of the Singapore Shipowners’ Association. He is<br />
currently a nominated member of Singapore’s parliament.<br />
He has won numerous accolades in his career including the<br />
Singapore International Mari<strong>time</strong> Centre award organised by<br />
the Mari<strong>time</strong> and Port Authority of Singapore.<br />
SS Teo’s younger brother, Choo Wee Teo, is executive<br />
director of Pacific Shipping Trust, which is now a wholly<br />
owned subsidiary of PIL after a buyout by the sponsor last year.<br />
Choo Wee Teo served as acting chief executive for PST from<br />
2009 through March, 2011, when he was replaced by Sim Keat<br />
Lim. He is said to be a close confidant of SS Teo, but prefers to<br />
stay out of the spotlight.<br />
Will PIL stay in the family? The smart money says yes, with<br />
several candidates currently at university. But that’s for the<br />
next generation to decide.<br />
ASiA<br />
next generation 2012 43
ASiA<br />
SinGAPore/norwAy tAiwAn<br />
Andreas Sohmen-Pao<br />
Sharing his father’s<br />
expansive outlook<br />
BW Gas’ growing influence is down to<br />
Andreas Sohmen-Pao<br />
ANDREAS Sohmen-Pao’s moves to expand the scope of BW<br />
Gas, a subsidiary of BW Group which is one of the world’s<br />
largest shipowners in tonnage terms, attest to his commitment<br />
to innovative solutions and showcase his role as now much<br />
more than a rising star in the shipping and energy industry.<br />
At the age of 41, he has paid his dues after entering the<br />
family business in 1999, but still qualifies as part of the next<br />
generation of shipping’s movers and shakers as long as his<br />
father, Helmut Sohmen, remains active in the industry.<br />
Unfortunately the son was travelling on business when<br />
Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong> contacted the company for a chat, but a fair bit is<br />
known about him and his company to appreciate what it has<br />
done to merit inclusion.<br />
For instance, the expansion was a canny bit of business,<br />
with the son creating a joint venture with InterEnergy Holdings<br />
last December to build a liquefied natural gas terminal on<br />
the southeastern coast of the Dominican Republic in the<br />
Caribbean, providing business for BW Gas’ own fleet of 13 LNG<br />
carriers to ship cargoes to the terminal.<br />
The company called this an “all-encompassing logistics<br />
solution” to bring gas to the Dominican Republic.<br />
Mr Sohmen-Pao is no stranger to such innovative solutions.<br />
A previous initiative involved refinancing by offering some<br />
of the company’s tanker fleet to its bankers as collateral in<br />
exchange for greater financing flexibility.<br />
With these decisions, he has proved he is much more than<br />
his academic credentials – which, by the way, are impeccable<br />
– and has the ability to exert BW Gas’ influence on the industry.<br />
The role of gas in the global energy mix is rising high on<br />
most countries’ agendas. BW Gas is in the right place at the<br />
right <strong>time</strong>, as is its chief executive.<br />
Innovative approach:<br />
Andreas Sohmen-Pao<br />
44 next generation 2012<br />
evergreen<br />
evergreen founder<br />
draws the line at<br />
family succession<br />
Chang Yung-fa has said none of his sons<br />
will control the Taiwanese company<br />
EVERGREEN founder and chairman Chang Yung-fa once<br />
famously declared that none of his sons would succeeded him<br />
as head of the company, and that he would rather bequeath<br />
day-to-day responsibility for the group to the senior managers<br />
who had helped him build up his business empire.<br />
That was five years ago, but nothing much seems to have<br />
changed in the interim.<br />
Dr Chang, now in his mid-eighties but very much in control<br />
of one of the world’s top container shipping lines, still seems<br />
estranged from his children.<br />
At one stage, all four of his sons had quit Evergreen, but one<br />
has since returned.<br />
Chang Kuo-wei, the youngest, is president of the group’s<br />
airline, Eva Air.<br />
In contrast to most of his peers, Dr Chang seems unconcerned<br />
about founding a shipping dynasty, although he has held out<br />
the possibility that one day some of of his grandchildren may<br />
rise to the top of the Taiwanese group.<br />
In the mean<strong>time</strong>, he is surrounded by a close-knit group<br />
of senior executives, including his second-in-command SS<br />
Lin, Evergreen Marine Corp chairman Bronson Hsieh, and<br />
vice group chairman Marcel Chang, who is in charge of all<br />
Evergreen’s European interests.<br />
“eventually, Dr Chang says he<br />
would prefer to be succeeded by<br />
one of those from this inner circle<br />
than by any of his sons”<br />
Dr Chang has made it clear that he has no retirement plans.<br />
Eventually, Dr Chang says he would prefer to be succeeded by<br />
one of those from this inner circle than by any of his sons, two<br />
of whom have worked for Evergreen Marine in the past. The<br />
eldest was president of Evergreen Marine Corp at one stage, as<br />
was third son Chang Kuo-cheng.<br />
But while apparently not held in high regard by their<br />
father for their management skills, the sons may well inherit<br />
the company one day. And that leaves open the question of<br />
whether they will want to become directly involved in the<br />
organisation, be content to let others run it, or even sell the<br />
family business.
ASiA<br />
tAiwAn<br />
chih-chien Hsu<br />
Family model offers foundation for success<br />
Eddie Steamship’s CC Hsu says new hands in a non-family<br />
shipping business can easily make rash decisions<br />
CHIH-CHIEN Hsu is in no doubt that shipping companies<br />
fare best in family hands, and would positively encourage his<br />
teenage children to pursue careers in an industry that he finds<br />
so exciting.<br />
Although still at school, his son and daughter are already<br />
well-travelled and accustomed to meeting people from many<br />
different backgrounds. They would probably find any other<br />
business far too dull, says Mr Hsu who was born into a wealthy<br />
Chinese shipping family.<br />
The chairman of privately owned Eddie Steamship Corp<br />
and the Singapore-listed dry bulk operator Courage Marine<br />
argues that, in such a volatile industry with extreme highs<br />
and lows, “a family business gives the company a continuity<br />
of knowledge and experience that helps keep it stable during<br />
these swings in the market”.<br />
Without this continuity, he says, “new hands in a nonfamily<br />
shipping business can easily make rash decisions that<br />
can bring down a company”.<br />
He himself has first-hand experience of how quickly<br />
fortunes can change. The family shipping business was almost<br />
wiped out in the 1980s, with the fleet shrinking from 60 ships<br />
to just three as banks foreclosed on loans. Mr Hsu, then a<br />
young graduate, joined in the fight to save the company from<br />
collapse.<br />
But there are other reasons why families may remain in<br />
shipping for many generations.<br />
That is because shipping assets are very easy to divide up<br />
between siblings by splitting the fleet so that each can go their<br />
separate ways, “thereby avoiding a violent clash that would<br />
cause the collapse of many other types of family businesses”.<br />
CC Hsu:<br />
family businesses<br />
benefit from<br />
continuity of<br />
knowledge<br />
46 next generation 2012<br />
Over the years, many shipping companies have been<br />
broken up into independent entities, yet all carry on using<br />
the family name.<br />
Shipping is also a very mobile business, with companies<br />
easily relocated should families have to move in <strong>time</strong>s of crisis,<br />
as Mr Hsu’s parents did during the political upheavals in China<br />
that forced them to flee to Taiwan.<br />
In 1946, Mr Hsu’s father had bought an ocean-going vessel.<br />
Then during the Communist revolution, most of the family’s<br />
factories and other businesses had to be abandoned. The only<br />
floating asset that could be moved away from mainland China<br />
was the ship. “That was our rice bowl,” Mr Hsu recalls.<br />
“new hands in a non-family<br />
shipping business can easily<br />
make rash decisions that can<br />
bring down a company”<br />
This mobility may be two-way. Many Chinese shipping<br />
companies and families that relocated from Shanghai to Hong<br />
Kong or Vancouver are now back in Shanghai. And many Greek<br />
shipping families and their businesses moved from Athens to<br />
other domiciles such as London before returning to Athens.<br />
Mr Hsu, whose early ambition was to be a sculptor, insists<br />
there was no pressure to join the family business.<br />
“It was simply assumed from the day I was born that I would<br />
become part of the family business. In fact, for many Chinese<br />
family firms, there is often no distinction between the ‘family’<br />
and the ‘business’,” he says.<br />
But family pressures or not, he loves the business of<br />
shipping.<br />
“Do I still get a buzz from shipping? Yes,” he replies most<br />
emphatically.<br />
And that is why he hopes his children will follow in his<br />
footsteps.<br />
“I think the most exciting aspect of shipping is the fact that<br />
it is a totally international industry and you deal with people<br />
from around the world every single day,” he says. With his<br />
daughter at boarding school in the UK and his son also likely to<br />
study in Britain, they are already used to travelling and mixing<br />
with all nationalities.<br />
“So I think they will easily acclimatise in this industry. In<br />
fact they may find most other industries quite boring,” says<br />
Mr Hsu.
uS indiA<br />
Ahmed rahman<br />
rahman shares<br />
enterprising spirit<br />
Buhari Group heir has also<br />
founded his own business<br />
OF THE four sons of billionaire BS Abdur Rahman, founder of<br />
conglomerate Buhari Group, which has a turnover in excess<br />
of $5bn a year and employs over 60,000 people, Ahmed was<br />
always the son destined to run a shipping business.<br />
He has the qualifications, holding a masters in shipping,<br />
trading and finance from the City University business school<br />
in London.<br />
True to the entrepreneurial spirit of his father, he has not<br />
sat on his laurels as one of the directors of the huge Buhari<br />
Group, but in 1998 founded the Coal & Oil Company, aimed at<br />
investing and trading in the energy sector.<br />
His company bought a bulk carrier to improve the supply<br />
chain and has plans to buy more ships and become more<br />
closely involved in the shipping side of things to bring down<br />
the costs of importing thermal coal into India.<br />
An intriguing video clip on YouTube shows it is not all<br />
about business, though, as he is interviewed while cooking<br />
for his family. The next shots show him in his office, telling the<br />
interviewer the importance of creating an office decor that is<br />
relaxing yet stimulating, the colour cherry being particularly<br />
good at generating this ambience in what is a “home from<br />
home” for the staff.<br />
true to the entrepreneurial spirit<br />
of his father, he has not sat on<br />
his laurels as one of the directors<br />
of the huge Buhari group, but<br />
in 1998 founded the Coal & oil<br />
Company<br />
Such consideration and attention to detail, at home and<br />
work, is impressive for someone who must be inundated with<br />
demands on their <strong>time</strong>. But as the old adage goes, if you want<br />
something done, ask a busy man.<br />
Expect, then, the Coal & Oil Company to expand its<br />
presence in shipping and energy sooner rather than later<br />
– especially given that thermal coal generates around 70%<br />
of India’s power – with the charismatic Ahmed Rahman<br />
showing he has what it takes to be a future head of the Buhari<br />
Group, if he wants it.<br />
uS indiA<br />
Anshuman and rewant ruia<br />
Cousins on a<br />
mission at essar<br />
Anshuman and Rewant Ruia are hard<br />
at work within sprawling conglomerate<br />
INDIA’S rapid growth on the world stage as a consumer of<br />
commodities is second only to China’s, and Essar Group,<br />
with its sprawling tentacles wrapped around everything from<br />
shipping to oil services and telecoms, embodies the dynamism<br />
of the subcontinent as much as any conglomerate.<br />
Already holding the reins of power within the group are<br />
two young executives, Rewant Ruia and cousin Anshuman<br />
Ruia, both under 30, and are already making waves in the<br />
international business world.<br />
rewant and cousin anshuman<br />
ruia, both under 30, and are<br />
already making waves in the<br />
international business world<br />
Anshuman, 29, the son of Shashi Ruia the chairman of Essar<br />
Group, is on the board of the group’s directors and is head<br />
director of Essar Shipping, a company with 25 vessels, mostly<br />
bulkers and offshore units.<br />
He may be young in business terms but he’s already had 10<br />
years of working his way up in the family business, and has a<br />
degree in business – an indication that it hasn’t all been silver<br />
spoons and special treatment handed down from dad.<br />
Perhaps reflecting his relative youth, he’s been put in<br />
charge of Essar’s move into the renewable energy sector; an<br />
increasingly important sector for Asian companies as climate<br />
change tops global political agendas, not least because of the<br />
benefits of economic growth provided by the green economy.<br />
Newer to the group is cousin Rewant, son of vice-chairman<br />
Ravi Ruia and the same age as Anshuman. Also a director of the<br />
group, he oversees the steel, mineral and retail business and<br />
has responsibility for the group’s North America operations.<br />
That would make him pretty busy, but he’ll have <strong>time</strong> to see his<br />
cousin; Essar Shipping signed a 15-year contract in the fourth<br />
quarter last year with Essar Steel to transport iron ore along<br />
the India coast.<br />
As these two cousins work closely together on long-term dry<br />
bulk shipping contracts to meet India’s rapid economic growth<br />
– avoiding the volatile spot market – one wonders how long it<br />
will be before they improve on Essar Shipping’s recent strong<br />
performances and replace the two brothers at the head of the<br />
table in the group’s boardroom.<br />
ASiA<br />
next generation 2012 47
uS<br />
uS<br />
tom crowley<br />
Confident Crowley continues<br />
to build family business<br />
Third-generation owner Tom Crowley has more than stepped up to the plate<br />
TOM Crowley stepped into his father’s shoes at a very young<br />
age, and is proving to be an ideal role model for those still<br />
waiting in the wings.<br />
As head of family-owned Crowley Mari<strong>time</strong>, Mr Crowley is<br />
not so much a member of the next generation, but one of the<br />
younger generation already holding a top mari<strong>time</strong> industry<br />
position.<br />
He has also shown vision and confidence in reshaping<br />
and diversifying the business his grandfather founded, while<br />
bringing a youthful dimension to a world still dominated by<br />
chairmen and chief executives two or three decades older.<br />
Not for him a suit and tie, but smart casual attire that goes<br />
with his easy informal manner.<br />
Mr Crowley is also convinced of the benefits of family<br />
control, particularly in a business like shipping.<br />
“We can make long-term decisions that could not be justified<br />
on a quarterly basis,” he says.<br />
The business is 100% family-owned, with minority<br />
shareholders bought out five years ago.<br />
Crowley Mari<strong>time</strong>, whose portfolio ranges from container<br />
shipping and logistics to product tankers, shipmanagement,<br />
harbour towage and salvage, has just pulled off a considerable<br />
coup. Its Titan subsidiary beat stiff competition to win the<br />
contract to remove the Costa Concordia wreck, with Mr Crowley<br />
personally involved in negotiations with insurers.<br />
Still in his mid-40s, Mr Crowley has been running Crowley<br />
Mari<strong>time</strong> since 1994 when he was appointed chief executive<br />
following the sudden death of his father. He was just 27 at the<br />
<strong>time</strong>.<br />
By then, he had gained plenty of experience, starting<br />
at the age of 16 as a ticket collector for the company’s San<br />
Francisco passenger service, the Red and White Fleet. He<br />
continued working for the company in a number of positions<br />
while attending college, and then entered Crowley Mari<strong>time</strong>’s<br />
management training programme.<br />
He is a third-generation Crowley, continuing to build up<br />
the business his grandfather started in 1892 with the purchase<br />
an 18 ft boat to transport personnel and supplies to ships<br />
anchored in San Francisco Bay.<br />
Today, Crowley Mari<strong>time</strong> has an annual turnover of around<br />
$2bn, with the business mix designed to protect revenue<br />
streams from excessive volatility, while also creating synergies<br />
between the different activities.<br />
Mr Crowley, who lives in the San Francisco area even<br />
though Crowley Mari<strong>time</strong> is headquartered in Florida, took<br />
the decision soon after he succeeded his father to lessen the<br />
48 next generation 2012<br />
Tom Crowley:<br />
a family business can make<br />
long-term decision that cannot<br />
be justified on a quarterly basis<br />
company’s dependence on container shipping. Latin American<br />
operations were sold to Hamburg Süd in 1999. Liner services<br />
and logistics now account for around half the group’s turnover.<br />
But Crowley Mari<strong>time</strong> is still an important player in the US<br />
container trades, giving Mr Crowley plenty of personal contact<br />
with the big global players. He is a member of the elite Box Club<br />
as well as on the board of the World Shipping Council.<br />
As he drives the business forward into the 21st century, Mr<br />
Crowley remains acutely conscious of the legacy bequeathed to<br />
him by his father and grandfather.<br />
“The constant over the past 100-plus years has been a desire<br />
to be the best at whatever we do,” he says.<br />
And he is also showing that family businesses can survive<br />
and thrive in shipping, with Crowley Mari<strong>time</strong> now one of the<br />
few remaining shipping concerns left in the US.
uS<br />
Fritz Heidenreich<br />
a program for success<br />
Tanker pool heir Fritz Heidenreich opted to turn his attentions to technology<br />
A SELF-PROFESSED computer geek who was born into a blueblooded<br />
shipping family has done what might appear to be<br />
the obvious thing – established himself as a shipping software<br />
expert in charge of a pathbreaking online service.<br />
However, Fritz Heidenreich has done this the old-fashioned<br />
way, through hard work, independent thinking and with the<br />
courage of his own convictions.<br />
As a youngster, Mr Heidenreich spent summers working in<br />
Heidmar, the tanker pool owned by his father, Per Heidenreich.<br />
He learnt about chartering and operations “on the ground<br />
floor”.<br />
However, a fascination with computers and a passion for<br />
programming, built upon a natural affinity for mathematics,<br />
science and outer space, led to an aerospace engineering<br />
degree. He never took over Heidmar itself. Instead, he and<br />
his team masterminded the Q88.com website for the tanker<br />
industry in the late 1990s.<br />
Mr Heidenreich came to head Heidenreich Innovations, an<br />
arm of the parent, in the early 2000s. After his father sold the<br />
company to Morgan Stanley – which in turn sold half of it to<br />
George Economou – Heidenreich Innovations spun itself off in<br />
2008.<br />
Today, it counts Heidmar merely as one of its 800-odd clients.<br />
His company and its Q88 offering, meanwhile, have already<br />
revolutionised life for charterers, vetting personnel, operations<br />
folks and owners, and today boasts a suite of 770 questionnaires.<br />
Of course, life for Mr Heidenreich has had its share of bumps.<br />
A dry bulk variation of Q88, Baltic99, was started with high<br />
uS<br />
Volckert van reesema<br />
Finding strength in family ties<br />
Volckert van Reesema coined a plan for Mid Ocean Marine with his father, Nickel<br />
A YOUNG man who began as a Pepsi management trainee,<br />
doing jobs that included operating forklifts, has established<br />
an unusual niche – as an owner focused on US-flag and Jones<br />
Act shipping, and, through his wife’s side of the family, on<br />
international offshore activities.<br />
Volckert van Reesema says Pepsi co-founder Don Kendall,<br />
who himself started off driving trucks, instilled a work ethic<br />
into him, for which he is still grateful.<br />
Software for shipping:<br />
Fritz Heidenreich<br />
hopes in 2008, but the market collapse immediately thereafter<br />
meant that it has elicited only a handful of clients so far.<br />
Undeterred, Mr Heidenreich and his team recently launched<br />
Milbros, a specialist information portal focused on liquid<br />
chemical transport. In contrast with dry and wet bulk, not all<br />
chemicals move by sea alone.<br />
“We are excited about adapting our skills to an entirely new<br />
area,” Mr Heidenreich says.<br />
Over the past four decades, his father, the indefatigable<br />
Dutch-American entrepreneur Nickel van Reesema, has<br />
established a name as a US-flag shipowner. Mr van Reesema<br />
cut his shipping teeth in Strong Vessel Operators, the liner<br />
company half-owned by his father. The two of them co-founded<br />
Mid Ocean Marine in 2007.<br />
Mid Ocean last year snapped up a 70%-built state-of-theart<br />
Jones Act product tanker, originally ordered for $124m by<br />
uS<br />
next generation 2012 49
uS<br />
AHL Shipping, at a bankruptcy auction for $12.7m. Together<br />
with private equity group Alterna Capital Partners, the<br />
company invested a further $60m to complete the ship, which<br />
is expected to begin trading this summer. Mid Ocean also has<br />
a majority interest in Great Lakes dry bulk player VanEnkevort<br />
Tug & Barge.<br />
However, this is only half of Mr van Reesema’s story. His late<br />
father-in-law, Willem Cordia, headed a shipping family as well.<br />
Mr van Reesema says he learnt a lot from the father-son bond<br />
Willem shared with Keesjan, Mr van Reesema’s brother-in-law,<br />
who today heads up Dutch jack-up rig player Workfox.<br />
<strong>On</strong> a philosophical plane, Mr van Reesema is more in tune<br />
with emerging technologies such as liquefied natural gas<br />
propulsion, while his father favours “proven technology”.<br />
Despite the “standard prodding and poking to test each other’s<br />
theories on various new ventures”, and the “odd hour each<br />
day” when they are at friendly loggerheads, he says he is<br />
fortunate to have a partner and mentor like his father.<br />
Mid Ocean’s next aspiration is to start a shipping fund<br />
focused on US-flag projects.<br />
uS<br />
kristian røkke<br />
tough yardstick for røkke heir<br />
Challenging <strong>time</strong>s for Kristian Røkke as he takes charge at Aker Philadelphia<br />
A LOW-PROFILE appointment as chief executive of Aker<br />
Philadelphia Shipyard in April 2011 fails to diminish either<br />
the significance of the mantle thrust upon Kristian Røkke’s<br />
shoulders, or its weight.<br />
Mr Røkke’s shipbuilding pedigree is top-drawer. His father,<br />
Norwegian billionaire Kjell Inge Røkke, has owned several<br />
successful shipyards, and in 2001 engineered the famous<br />
takeover of Kvaerner, the European shipbuilding giant.<br />
With the conquest came Kvaerner Philadelphia – the defunct<br />
navy yard that Kvaerner, with hundreds of millions of dollars of<br />
help from local governments, had pledged to revive as a leading<br />
Jones Act shipbuilder.<br />
Success in this endeavour has been modest. The yard<br />
debuted by delivering four containerships to Matson Navigation,<br />
and then built a dozen product tankers bareboated to Overseas<br />
Shipholding Group. It is currently building two aframax crude<br />
tankers for ExxonMobil’s US-flag subsidiary SeaRiver Mari<strong>time</strong>,<br />
and two product tankers on a speculative basis.<br />
Mr Røkke has taken the top job comes at a <strong>time</strong> when Jones Act<br />
shipbuilding itself is in flux. In addition, he must contend with<br />
a strong union presence in Philadelphia, renowned through the<br />
ages as a tough steel town.<br />
A US citizen, born when his father lived here, Mr Røkke began<br />
as a 17-year-old trawler deckhand in Alaska, and worked as a<br />
pipe fitter in his father’s yards in Norway.<br />
50 next generation 2012<br />
Van Reesema:<br />
fortunate to have his father<br />
as a business partner<br />
Shipbuilding role:<br />
Kristian Røkke<br />
He is a highly qualified graduate, having attended Colby<br />
College in Maine, the London School of Economics and the<br />
Norwegian School of Management.<br />
He has worked his way up through the ranks at Aker<br />
Philadelphia since joining in 2007. It is now up to this<br />
thoughtful, well-travelled young man to make sense of, let alone<br />
build on, the tempestuous labour relations situation in his new<br />
hometown, as his yard seeks to make a name for itself in the<br />
country of his birth.
on our radar<br />
So far, the next generation magazine has focused on the families that are dominant<br />
in the shipping industry. However, there are some rising stars who warrant a<br />
mention in this magazine because of their entrepreneurial spirit, their leadership<br />
capabilities or simply because they have recently landed a top job.<br />
Leon Patitsas Atlas Mari<strong>time</strong><br />
A STRONG family pedigree in shipping, based on the traditions<br />
of the tiny Aegean island of Oinousses, has helped to prepare<br />
Leon Patitsas, 36, for the business of waiting out markets for the<br />
right <strong>time</strong> to invest in vessels. His company, Atlas Mari<strong>time</strong>, was<br />
established in 2003 after a division of family shipping interests<br />
and a flurry of deals in the next few years sculpted a highly<br />
focused fleet of six aframax tankers.<br />
Frequently mentioned in banking circles as a candidate<br />
for a public listing when the capital markets were more<br />
entertaining of the industry, Atlas has been modelled on more<br />
Engendering<br />
enterprise:<br />
clockwise from<br />
top left, Leon<br />
Patitsas, Harry<br />
Vafias, Michael<br />
Skov and Jeffery<br />
Landsberg<br />
on our rAdAr<br />
corporate lines than many family-held shipping vehicles and is<br />
considered to be primed for growth when the moment is right.<br />
With financial and shipping markets under a cloud, the owner<br />
has had to be patient, although a seventh aframax was recently<br />
added to the fleet.<br />
“Atlas has built a corporate culture based on loyalty and<br />
meritocracy,” says Mr Patitsas, who is a mechanical engineer<br />
and holds a masters in ocean systems management from<br />
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “Employees ashore and<br />
at sea feel part of the family. We are passionate about our work<br />
and committed to our industry.”<br />
next generation 2012 51
on our rAdAr<br />
Evangelos Pistiolis Top Ships<br />
EVANGELOS Pistiolis announced his presence on the big<br />
stage of world shipping with a bang in July 2004 when he took<br />
his company Top Tankers public on Nasdaq. It was the largest<br />
initial public offering of a tanker company in the US for five years<br />
and ushered in what would prove a new era for shipping in the<br />
public capital markets.<br />
The IPO raised $146m to buy 10 tankers from Sovcomflot<br />
and within the same year another $130m was raised, partly for<br />
acquiring five suezmaxes from Essar.<br />
In early 2005, Top Tankers made a bid to diversify with the<br />
acquisition of a fleet of 15 bulkers. If it had succeeded, the history<br />
of the company could have been quite different, but financial<br />
markets were tightening their purse strings and a proposed<br />
private placement to fund the deal fizzled out.<br />
To be renamed Top Ships, the owner entered the dry bulk<br />
market on a more modest scale later on, but when the dry bulk<br />
boom had almost run its course.<br />
Although a series of six 50,000 dwt product-chemical tankers<br />
were delivered by SPP Shipbuilding in 2009 and hired out on<br />
bareboat charters, Mr Pistiolis has spent much of the last few<br />
years weathering the storm and has been innovative in chopping<br />
back Top Ships’ expenses.<br />
The hard-working 39-year-old will no doubt bounce back to<br />
more aggressive shipping deals. Now dividing his <strong>time</strong> mainly<br />
between Greece and offices in Monaco, where a new privately<br />
held family outfit, Central Shipping, has been established,<br />
Mr Pistiolis gave a recent hint of things to come with Central’s<br />
maiden order for two product tanker newbuildings at the STX<br />
Offshore & Shipbuilding yard in Dalian, China.<br />
Harry Vafias Stealthgas<br />
FEW Greek shipowners combine a grasp of new business tools<br />
and old-fashioned hands-on involvement with such alacrity as<br />
Harry Vafias.<br />
Mr Vafias, chief executive of Nasdaq-listed StealthGas and<br />
de facto head of his family’s private shipping empire, has the<br />
curriculum vitae of an old hand in the industry but is still<br />
only 34.<br />
After gaining sale and purchase and chartering experience<br />
with top London shipbrokers Seascope and Braemar, he<br />
joined his father’s dry bulk shipping business Brave Mari<strong>time</strong><br />
in 1999 and in the same year launched Stealth Mari<strong>time</strong>, a<br />
sister company marking the family’s first foray into tankers. It<br />
was an instant success and foreshadowed the group’s future<br />
development to the extent that today the group comprises 34<br />
liquefied petroleum gas carriers, eight LPG newbuilds and 22<br />
tankers with just two bulkers.<br />
Running a public company has offered a broader education<br />
than a family business, says Mr Vafias. However, he credits<br />
his father Nikos for allowing him not only seed capital but the<br />
freedom to develop the business his way. “You also need lots<br />
of luck, determination, a thick skin, ambition and to be able to<br />
judge people’s characters,” he says.<br />
Lucius Bunk and Alexander Tebbe Auerbach Schifffahrt<br />
GERMAN shipping may be weathering one of most<br />
challenging periods in its history but this has not stopped<br />
52 next generation 2012<br />
Keeping watch:<br />
clockwise from top<br />
left, Hanne Sørensen,<br />
Grant Daly, Abhishek<br />
Pandey, Birgit Liodden,<br />
Krish, Krishnamurthi<br />
and Julie Lithgow<br />
33-year-old Lucius Bunk and 30-year-old Alexander Tebbe<br />
from starting up a new venture.<br />
Their shipping company Auerbach Schifffahrt, set up<br />
in 2010, eventually wants to control the whole value chain<br />
for small bulkers and general cargo vessels. Like KG funds,<br />
the company relies on wealthy private investors, but with<br />
Auerbach, they play much more of an entrepreneurial role.<br />
Though young, the two company founders have already<br />
gained quite an impressive track record in the shipping<br />
business, both in Germany and abroad. Mr Tebbe has worked<br />
for various owners, brokers and KG financiers after studing ship<br />
finance in London. Mr Bunk studied Sinology before joining the<br />
management programme of a Hamburg shipping company. He<br />
is now spearheading Auerbach’s expansion into Asia.<br />
Jeffrey Landsberg Commodore Research & Consultancy<br />
JEFFREY Landsberg’s entrepreneurial spirit came at just the<br />
right <strong>time</strong> in the shipping downturn because since setting up<br />
Commodore Research & Consultancy in March 2010, he has<br />
made a name for himself as a leading provider of dry bulk<br />
information.<br />
The New York-based company’s biggest coup is the<br />
exclusive partnership it has formed with the China National<br />
Shipping Service, a government organisation based in Beijing<br />
that works with Chinese shipowners, for which Commodore is<br />
a paid consultant.
What sets Commodore apart from the research arms of large<br />
shipbrokers is that the company has no agenda other than<br />
to supply information to the market, whether that is through<br />
its subscriptions-based reports or bespoke consultancy. It<br />
focuses heavily on cargo supply and demand, rather than<br />
on fleet supply, and is quick off the mark in distributing<br />
information.<br />
“This is our bread and butter – we have to do it very well,”<br />
says Mr Landsberg. “And although our primary client base is<br />
still shipowners and traders – the pure dry bulk players – we’re<br />
also seeing a lot more interest and business from the hedge<br />
funds and financial groups.”<br />
Commodore was established when Mr Landsberg was<br />
just 27. After reading Asian studies at Boston University, he<br />
spent <strong>time</strong> at Hanjin Shipping in Seoul before working as a<br />
derivatives broker in Singapore and then Norway.<br />
Mikael Skov Tankers Inc<br />
THE one <strong>time</strong> operating officer and interim boss at Torm,<br />
Michael Skov took his expertise and contacts to set up Tankers<br />
Inc when his tenure came to an end.<br />
The entrepreneur secured enough financing to bide his <strong>time</strong><br />
and is now beginning to play his cards. Newbuilding orders<br />
and a potentially lucrative contract with Nordic Tankers, now<br />
called Nordic Shipholding, will help set up his business just as<br />
many hope the tanker markets opens up again.<br />
on our rAdAr<br />
Christian Bonfils Nordic Bulk Carriers<br />
A MAN with a niche on his mind, Christian Bonfils co-launched<br />
Nordic Bulk Carriers to focus on utilising high ice class dry<br />
bulk tonnage, and in the process becoming a key actor in the<br />
development of the northern sea route.<br />
Mr Bonfils’ priority is finding winter cargoes in the Baltic<br />
sea for his fleet of owned and chartered in tonnage, but he is<br />
now pushing to increase summer cargoes through the northern<br />
sea route between northern Europe and Asia and becoming<br />
a champion in the drive to get more transparency from the<br />
Russian authorities.<br />
Julie Lithgow Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers<br />
APPOINTED director of the Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers<br />
last year, Julie Lithgow is one of a new generation of men and<br />
women breaking into top shipping industry jobs. She readily<br />
admits to being surprised that she was picked for the post<br />
but members have taken to her and have applauded the fresh<br />
approach she brings to the job. The London-headquartered<br />
institute sets the professional standards for shipbrokers,<br />
shipmanagers and ship agents, with some 5,000 ICS exams<br />
sat each year in countries worldwide. Ms Lithgow, who has a<br />
mari<strong>time</strong> studies degree, spent <strong>time</strong> at the Nautical Institute,<br />
V.Holdings and Pole Star before she joined the ICS. <strong>On</strong>e of her<br />
key tasks now is to ensure the ICS retains its position as the<br />
leading professional body while reforming the way the institute<br />
is run, and deciding on its future role.<br />
Birgit Liodden Youngships<br />
BIRGIT Liodden has become the figurehead for Youngships<br />
International, a Norway-based association of budding<br />
junior executives wanting to make a mark for themselves in<br />
the shipping industry. She represents the hope of the next<br />
generation, and her constant enthusiasm won her this year’s<br />
Women’s International Shipping & Trading Association<br />
leadership award 2012 for her efforts to raise the profile of the<br />
shipping industry, particularly in a bid to attract more women<br />
into the industry.<br />
Her tireless efforts have been instrumental in raising the<br />
profile of Youngships and expanding the organisation outside<br />
Norway. Her knowledge, enthusiasm and standing within<br />
tomorrow’s generation of shipping executive mark her out as a<br />
future shipping leader.<br />
Andreas Chrysostomou IMO<br />
THE Cypriot chair of the mari<strong>time</strong> environmental protection<br />
committee has his work cut out. Andreas Chrysostomou<br />
is responsible for directing the International Mari<strong>time</strong><br />
Organization’s debates on climate change, keeping them on<br />
track and focused. A contender in last year’s race to become<br />
the IMO’s secretary-general, Capt Chrysostomou has a network<br />
of contacts, and this, along with his personality, sets him out<br />
from the pack.<br />
Krish Krishnamurthi The Nautical Institute<br />
KRISH Krishnamurthi has just become the youngest president<br />
of the Nautical Institute. Known to be passionate about<br />
improving safety at sea through professional standards, Capt<br />
next generation 2012 53
on our rAdAr<br />
Krishnamurthi played a key role in setting up The Nautical<br />
Institute’s India South branch in 2001. Capt Krishnamurthi<br />
has more than 20 years of industry experience. He went to sea<br />
in 1982, becoming master after a distinguished career with<br />
companies including Univan, Bergessen Worldwide, Bernhard<br />
Schulte and Tanker Pacific. In 2007, he came ashore and is<br />
currently vice-president, operations – technical for Sanmar<br />
Shipping Ltd Chennai.<br />
Suyin Anand, Tabitha Logan and Marija Pospisil Young<br />
Professionals in Shipping Network<br />
HONG Kong’s Young Professionals in Shipping Network has<br />
attracted more than 500 members since its foundation in 2010.<br />
Founded by Suyin Anand, Tabitha Logan and Marija Pospisil,<br />
the YPSN has evolved from an organiser of informal social<br />
gatherings of friends and colleagues to a semi-official forum<br />
for young professionals to meet their peers from shipowners,<br />
charterers, shipmanagers, shipbrokers, insurers and law firms.<br />
Its quarterly event usually draws more than 200 attendees.<br />
The three women behind the YPSN have invested much of<br />
their spare <strong>time</strong> in building the network’s membership despite<br />
working long hours in the shipping industry. Ms Anand is<br />
solicitor with law firm Ince & Co, Ms Logan works for Mari<strong>time</strong><br />
Capital Shipping and Ms Pospisil is a senior claims executive at<br />
the North of England P&I Association.<br />
Claudio Chiste Banca IMI<br />
CLAUDIO Chiste is a ship finance specialist at the London<br />
branch of Italy’s Banca IMI and chair of the Shipping<br />
Professional Network in London, a network for young shipping<br />
professionals. The Cass Business School graduate is also one of<br />
the few people in this supplement to have a military background<br />
– he started his career as a lieutenant in the combat branch of<br />
the navy in South Africa.<br />
Grant Daly Safmarine<br />
GRANT Daly, 41, took the helm as Safmarine chief executive<br />
in February this year. Previously the head of multipurpose<br />
vessels, the South African has been charged with overseeing<br />
the merger of Safmarine’s management activities into Maersk<br />
Line. AP Moller-Maersk acquired the South African shipping<br />
group in 1999 and the company was allowed to operate fairly<br />
independently until the plan was announced in October 2011.<br />
In the past decade, Safmarine’s headquarters may have<br />
moved from Cape Town via Antwerp to Copenhagen but,<br />
says Mr Daly, this doesn’t mean a diminished Africa focus.<br />
“Safmarine has strong South African ties and we still regard<br />
ourselves as an Africa specialist. Africa remains a vital market<br />
for us,” he told Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong> earlier this year. The married father<br />
of two is regarded by colleagues as a true Safmariner, but with<br />
more than 17 years at the company under his belt, that is hardly<br />
surprising.<br />
Birgitte Ringstad Vartdal Golden Ocean<br />
BIRGITTE Ringstad Vartdal has been financial officer at<br />
Golden Ocean Group for about 18 months. She came to the<br />
group after cutting her teeth within the privately owned<br />
Norwegian shipowner Torvald Klavness Group where she<br />
54 next generation 2012<br />
worked in a number of positions including vice-president of<br />
finance.<br />
The young Norwegian found herself headhunted into<br />
Golden Ocean and has shone ever since. Ms Vartdal is also<br />
listed as a board member of Vartdal Fishing, an Ålesund-based<br />
family-run business and in the family-focused investment<br />
management firm run with other family members. She has<br />
masters degrees in financial mathematics and in physics and<br />
mathematics. She has a reputation in Oslo’s mari<strong>time</strong> circles<br />
for being extremely hard working, is held in high esteem and<br />
tipped for a bright future.<br />
Hanne Sørensen Maersk Tankers<br />
HANNE Sørensen has been at AP Moller-Maersk for nearly<br />
20 years but the previously low-profile executive escaped the<br />
attentions of Lloyd’s <strong>List</strong> until this January. At just 46, she has<br />
taken the helm of one of the world’s leading tanker companies<br />
in terms of tonnage owned and chartered-in. With bags of<br />
experience behind her as chief commercial officer of Maersk<br />
Line and Asian finance chief, the sky’s the limit for Ms Sørensen.<br />
Could we be looking at the first female chief executive of the<br />
world’s biggest and most influential shipping company?<br />
Luis Benito Lloyd’s Register<br />
AFTER many years of involvement with Lloyd’s Register’s<br />
South Korean operation, Luis Benito has recently been<br />
appointed Lloyd’s Register’s global strategic marketing<br />
manager, marine and has relocated to Singapore. As manager<br />
of LR’s Korea marine development team from 2006, Mr Benito<br />
helped to make LR gain the largest market share in the South<br />
Korea’s newbuilding market. Mr Benito’s role is a new one for<br />
LR, and recognises that Asia is now the world’s main shipping<br />
hub. Previously, the global strategic marketing manager for<br />
the class society resided in London. The move to Singapore<br />
complements LR’s development of its second major research<br />
centre in Singapore, a companion to the centre now under full<br />
steam at Southhampton.<br />
Abhishek Pandey Standard Chartered<br />
AGED 34, Abhishek Pandey has been the key man for growing<br />
Standard Chartered’s shipping portfolio from the ground<br />
up to $4.4bn within five years. The UK-based, Asia-focused<br />
bank is one of the few banks owning a fleet, and Mr Pandey<br />
has utilised his past work experiences with shipping lines to<br />
the great benefit of the bank. Aside from being involved with<br />
several award-winning deals involving Korea Gas and ABG<br />
International, Mr Pandey was also instrumental in starting<br />
Standard Chartered’s ship lease business in 2010.<br />
Barry Wingate HSBC<br />
BARRY Wingate is director of global banking at HSBC<br />
Investment Bank in London, having worked on various aspects<br />
of the bank’s business since leaving Glasgow University. He also<br />
has an MSc in shipping, trade and finance from Cass Business<br />
School. Scottish-born Mr Wingate is 40 and has become a<br />
regular speaker at key industry events. He lists his specialities as<br />
offshore oilfield services, industrial shipping and the mari<strong>time</strong><br />
leisure market.
Open for<br />
entries<br />
Matt Dias<br />
+44 (0)20 7017 4188<br />
@ matt.dias@lloydslist.com<br />
Wednesday 26 September<br />
Lancaster Hotel, London<br />
New for 2012: The Next Generation Award<br />
Enter now at www.lloydslist.com/globalawards<br />
Deadline for entries: 15 June 2012<br />
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