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 Press Information
S5: A new force on the international ship agency scene
28 October 2004
A new global shipping agency company, S5 Agency World Ltd, has been
established in London with regional hub centres in the US, North Europe, Southern Europe,
Middle East, South Africa, Asia Pacific and Australia.
It will provide major operators, ship owners, charterers and managers
with worldwide agency coverage whilst maintaining strong local contact points.
Whilst S5 is a new force in international shipping, it is built on
strong foundations with a long heritage through its stakeholders stretching back to the
early 19th century.
S5 will offer clients seeking international hub agencies:
- An international agency company with a strong investment base
- Flexible trans-regional products tailored to the client’s specific needs
- Complete operational and financial transparency
- World class integrated systems
- A management team experienced in managing international partnerships.
Heading up the S5 management team are H W (Win) Thurber as Chairman,
Chief Executive Officer Nick Lane and Chief Operating Officer Graham Bog. They are
supported by Jim Ward as IT/Systems Director and Ira Rudnick as Global Financial Hub
Director.
The stakeholders are:
- Kerr Norton Strachan in the Americas (working with Agunsa in South America)
- Royal Burger Group in North Europe
- Euroshipping in South Europe and North and West Africa
- Kanoo Group in the Middle East
- Sturrock in South and East Africa
- Jardines in Asia Pacific
- McArthur Shipping in Australia
Handling in excess of 40,000 port calls a year, S5’s stakeholders
all have strong and deep-rooted experience of running and managing shipping agency
operations in their particular geographic regions but recognise that in the 21st
century many international clients require the facility to one-stop shop with a single
trans-regional agency company, a function S5 has been created to fulfil.
‘Agency World’, S5' s state of the art IT system,
is seen as a key differentiating factor, enabling S5's unparalleled operational
depth to be harnessed to significantly facilitate clients' voyage management.
The system has been developed by drawing on a wealth
of IT and operational expertise from around the globe. Fully integrated, Agency
World offers clients complete operational and financial transparency. This is
achieved through a fully automated web- based tool (complete with
operational alerts) for managing the vessel call, an ability to view the daily updated
disbursement position and a highly flexible management information module
which assists the client in making sound business decisions.
Graham Bog explains that the name S5 reflects the five key elements in
S5’s product offering, namely:
- Shipping
- Service
- Systems
- Solutions
- Security
It also highlights the geographic regions: Americas, Europe, Africa,
Middle East, Asia Pacific and Australasia.
In planning this new venture the partners considered setting up a
network but very soon dismissed the idea, explains Win Thurber:
"By setting up a single international agency company rather than a
network, we have established a legal entity with substantial backing. Owned and supported
by regional market leaders in the shipping agency industry, all of whom have excellent
reputations and standing, we have both the technical expertise and financial strength to
guarantee our ability to provide a highly professional global service to our clients.
"We have created a corporate structure capable of contracting with
international clients and then managing these contracts with a high level of professional
expertise and efficiency, backed by world-class systems and an international management
structure."
Nick Lane believes that S5’s unique characteristics provide
clients with absolute financial security.
"S5 is a single company with a stable ownership structure. It is
able to offer an individual customer a single contract backed by a contractual framework
with its stakeholders. Our global/regional hub processes and banking structure provide the
client with unrivalled security."
Win Thurber concludes:
"S5 will be offering its customers an unprecedented degree of
transparency in all aspects of the operation. This will form the foundation of future
longterm relationships based on trust, service, efficiency and a sharing of mutual
objectives.
"S5 is proud of the fact that ‘Shipping is our
business’."
Note to editors:
Photographs to accompany this release are available on the Dunelm
website at www.dunelmpr.co.uk.
Click on the photogallery button, then the S5 logo and you will be taken to a selection of
thumbnail images which lead to downloadable photographs (300 dpi).
For further information:
Graham Bog
Chief Operating Officer
S5 Agency World Ltd
Drewry House
231 Marsh Wall
London E14 9FJ
Tel: +44 207 515 4888
Mobile: +44 79405 77873
Email: graham.bog @ s-5.org
Web site: www.s-5.org
Press release issued by:
Dunelm Public Relations Ltd
Gun Court
70 Wapping Lane
London E1W 2RD
Tel: +44 20 7480 0600
Fax: +44 20 7480 0606
www.dunelmpr.co.uk
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