Nedlloyd
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Contents |
[edit] History
Netherland Line, Stoomvaart Maatschappij Nederland – SMN was founded in Amsterdam in the year 1870 and the Royal Rotterdam Lloyd, Koninklijke Rotterdamsche Lloyd – KRL was founded in Rotterdam in the year 1875. Both shipping companies were actively trading on the Dutch East Indies, the Asian overseas parts of the Kingdom of the Netherlands now known as Indonesia. The Koninklijke Paketvaart Maatschappij – KPM was founded in Amsterdam in the year 1888, with the operational head office in Batavia, now known as Jakarta. Both the SMN and the KRL offered regular mail services between the Dutch Indies and the Netherlands, whereas KPM rendered inter-island services in the Indian archipelago.
After the turn of the century the Royal Interocean Lines, Koninklijke Java-China Paketvaart Lijnen was founded in Amsterdam in the year 1902. The RIL established an operational head office at Hong Kong in the middle of its trading area, in addition of the domestic inter-island services of KPM.
To ensure independence and to be protected against involuntary take-overs by competitors SMN, KRL and KPM formed the NV Nederlandsche Scheepvaart Unie in 1908, which also meant that the individual shipping companies were restricted to their agreed trading areas. Highlights of the pre-war developments were the introduction of passenger mail services sailing alternating from Amsterdam and Rotterdam via Suez and the Red Sea to Batavia, in addition to the regular freight services. The inter-island service with connections to Hong Kong was rendered by the KPM and RIL with passenger- mail vessels viz; Boussevain, Tegelberg, Nieuw Holland. Passenger vessels managed by SMN and KRL were: Oranje, Johan van Oldenbarneveld, Indrapoera, Christiaan Huygens, Nieuw Holland, Marnix van St. Aldegonde, Johan de Wit. The well-known Willem Ruys was still under construction at the beginning of WW2 at the shipyard in Vlissingen / Flushing and was flooded on the shipyard during till 1945.
[edit] Post-war developments
After WW2 the co-operation between KRL and SMN extended to other geographical areas under the name Nedlloyd Lines and trading to and from the Dutch East Indies started again together with the Royal Interocean Lines in the outer circle and the KPM in the inter-island inner circle, the operations continued till the year 1958 when, influenced by the political situation and the declaration of independence of the former colony the Dutch East Indies – Indonesia all Dutch shipping operations were banned and ceased to exist resulting in the majority of the inter island KPM fleet being laid up at Singapore. As a consequence the KJCPL (RIL) and KPM amalgamated in 1967 and operations continued under the name RIL.
[edit] Verenigde Nederlandse Scheepvaartmaatschappij
After WW2 the Verenigde Nederlandse Scheepvaartmaatschappij (VNS) was formed and jointly owned by KRL, SMN, Holland Amerika Lijn, Van Ommeren and KNSM. In practice VNS was operating under different names viz Holland Africa Line, Holland Persian Gulf Line, Holland Pakistan/India Line, Holland Fareast Line, Holland Australia Line, emphasizing the various trades. The VNS was the playground for improved integration and introduction of operational guinea pigs like containers with the name “Kerklines” resulting in new operational systems viz unit-loads on the Australia service and extending vessels plying to the Fareast with a container hold to meet the initial demand for container space. This all meant that in 1968 the first full container vessel “Abel Tasman” was ordered for the AECS consortium for the Europe / Australia trade on Australia, followed in 1980 by two full container vessels “Nedlloyd Delft” and “Nedlloyd Dejima” for the Scan Dutch consortium for the Europe Fareast trade.
[edit] Nedlloyd Profile
The more traditional SMN, RIL and KRL were facing cumbersome times which resulted in a government supervised analysis reviewing the current (1969) situation. A proper feasibility study – presented by Jan J. Oyevaar reviewed competitiveness, future outlook, financial forecast. The analysis recommended a merger between the major Dutch shipping companies which resulted in the formation on June 15th, 1970 of the Koninklijke Nedlloyd with a total seagoing fleet of 84 vessels, as part of the Nederlandsche Scheepvaart Unie N.V holding company. As from the start in 1970 the SMN, KRL and VNS, now called Koninklijke Nedlloyd, played a dominant role in this merger and for a variety of reasons the RIL was kept outside the Nedlloyd scope and remained a separate entity managed from Hong Kong with 53 seagoing vessels.
In the year 1977 the holding company Nederlandsche Scheepvaart Unie was renamed Koninklijke Nedlloyd Groep N.V. – Royal Nedlloyd Group.
[edit] Koninklijke Nederlandsche Stoomboot Maatschappij
During 1980 the financial situation of the KNSM Group - Koninklijke Nederlandsche Stoomboot Maatschappij – had detoriated considerably so the Group re-entered into discussions with Nedlloyd resulting in an amalgamation. Earlier the KNSM was still optimistic about surviving in the trading areas of the Caribbean, Mediterranean and South America. For that reason KNSM had taken over in 1970 the already in 1908 founded Koninklijke Hollandsche Lloyd – Royal Holland Lloyd, which plied between Europe and Brazil, Uruguay and Argentine and well-known from the passenger vessels plying between Amsterdam and South America with mainly Eastern European emigrants in the post WW1 depression. Also the Batavier Line was integrated under the new name Kroonburgh. To diversify KNSM also bought Mammoet Transport and Transavia Airlines. End 1980 all discussions were concluded and both shipping companies were added to the worldwide Nedlloyd Lines network.
It can now be concluded that this giant merger took about 10 years, with the total rationalisation of the seagoing shipping activities a separate problem surfaced – coping with strong headed management and decades old cultures. The pluriformaty of the original shipping companies could not be melted down into a new brand well in time.
In 1985 the Nedlloyd Group initiated a diversification programme and introduced a split in divisions, including non shipping divisions. Overall the newly formed group had difficulty in identifying their own core activity, the door – to door thinking initiated by the development of worldwide forwarding and parcel services basically connected to the shipping pipeline – the early start of chain management. The forwarding takeovers in Germany were rather costly but also very unsuccessfully bleeding the cash so desperately required for the new building programme of fuel economic container vessels. Investments made in the Nedlloyd Bulk division turned out to be money losers, due to a parcel tanker new building programme and the construction of a technically very advanced LNG tanker Gastor, which after new building was laid up together with her sister vessel Nestor in Scotland. Nedlloyd’s finale The Nedlloyd Group was missing the real strategic views and over expanded in non core activities into areas Nedlloyd regrettably did not fully understand. The desperately required commercial views were overshadowed by a “cashier’s mentality” resulting in a hostile take-over attempt in the late eighties by the Norwegian investor Torstein Hagen, aimed at steering back to the real shipping activities, leaving the Nedlloyd Group management panic stricken digging in and manoeuvring into self defensive tactics, with the help of shareholders meetings, without facing the real problems.
As from 1990, only a decade after the taking over KNSM and KHL, and only 20 years after having been established the Koninklijke Nedlloyd Groep was facing a financial disaster and was forced to cash in by selling most of its non shipping assets and for the first time in its long history banks were dictating the rules and pulling the strings. The shipping group no longer owned the new building and lease plans were created to finance the new building programme and save the group from insolvency.
[edit] P&O Nedlloyd
In 1997 the loss-making Nedlloyd Lines – the liner shipping division - merged with the loss-making British P & O Container and continued as P & O Nedlloyd. The objective was joining forces, improve ICT systems and integrate deeply to turn the total shipping operation around.
• In 1999 most of the land based activities of the Nedlloyd Group were sold. Van Gend & Loos purchased only in 1986, Nedlloyd Road Cargo and other minor wheel based activities were sold to Deutsche Post / Danzas and what remained was a 50% share in P&O Nedlloyd.
• Through reversed listing in 2004 on the Amsterdam exchange the name Nedlloyd was exchanged into P&O Nedlloyd and the original Nedlloyd shares were also swapped.
• In the year 2005 A.P. Møller – Maersk made a definite and final bid on the P & O Nedlloyd shares and with the consent of the shareholders A.P. Møller – Maersk took over P&O Nedlloyd.
A shipping company, P&O Nedlloyd, with its roots in facilitating Dutch and British colonial trading in a bygone and colonial era in both the West and the East, ceased to exist.
[edit] Nedlloyd (EA) Ltd
The Holland Afrika Lijn Mombasa was founded in 1934 and transformed into Nedlloyd (EA) Ltd in line with the merger of the founding companies in 15th June 1970, when also the new name Koninklijke Nedlloyd NV (Royal Nedlloyd) was introduced and the original name “Holland Afrika Lijn” was changed into Nedlloyd (EA).
[edit] History
Before 1934 the Twentsche Overzeesche Handel Maatschappij (TOM) acted as agents for the Holland Africa Line along the East African Coast and at that time, Mr. S. Mook, later a director of the VNS, was the Inspector for East Africa stationed at Mombasa. The Holland Africa Line was registed as a separate entity on 11th September 1934, and the first director/Manager was Mr M.A. van Pelt. Apart from handling the Holland Africa Line vessels, the Agency also operated a feeder service with the coaster m.v. “Tayari” and a fleet of seven barges which were towed up and down the coast by the tugboat m.v. “Upesi”, occasionally assisted by the tugboat m.v. “Holland”which was stationed at Beira, Mozambique. The bargefleet and the coaster were mainly employed in collecting sisal from the various smaller ports along the coast and can now be seen as an early example of coastal trading to ensure efficiency of the seagoing freighters. Due to changing patterns in trade and develoipments in both the commercial and political fields, the feeder services by coaster and barge were abandoned around 1955. The Royal Interocean Lines (KJCPL) had their own organisation in Africa, with Durban as their regional head office. At Mombasa, they were represented by Mackenzie Dalgety whilst the RIL also had their own representative, dealing mainly with commercial matters, at Mombasa. Following the merger in the year 1970 Nedlloyd Lines and Royal Interocean Lines continued to function separately although the name Holland Africa Line had already been changed into Nedlloyd (EA) Ltd, it was not until the 1st January, 1975 however the actual shipping activities were amalgamated and that the “Royal Interocean Lines Agency” was transferred from Mackenzie Dalgety to Nedlloyd (EA) Ltd.
[edit] Profile
In anticipation of the merger Nedlloyd (EA) had already moved to more spacious and modern offices along Moi Avenue closer to Kilindini Port. Nedlloyd established a branch office in Nairobi to improve on the commercial activities and the issuance of Bills of Lading, Mr James Mbugua was the first Nairobi manager. Nedlloyd (EA) fulfilled a dual function. On the one hand it was the operational agent which handled all Nedlloyd vessels calling at Mombasa and on the other Nedlloyd (EA) the Area and Commercial Management for Eastern Africa covering Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia, Sechelles and even Madagascar. In the seventies Eastern Africa was served by liner services from / to Europe, Far East, Australia/New Zealand and the US Pacific basin. In addition to the Nedlloyd owned services the Christensen Canadian African Lines (CCAL) offered a monthly service between East and South Africa and Canada. Nedlloyd was on the other hand also operational agent for the Holland America Cruises, with bi-annual calls on the “Round the World Cruise” of the legendary s.s. “Rotterdam” and Smit International. Nedlloyd (EA) were also the Managing Agents for the Mercury Shipping Lines, a continuation of the former KPM / RIL services plying between Africa and the Middle East, managed outside the scope of the regular Nedlloyd Lines services. During the year 1980 Nedlloyd (EA) was employing 60 of which only three were expatriates. In line with Nedlloyd policy opportunities were given to local staff to take on responsiblities resulting in a continued reduction of the number of expatriates. In the year 1983, the last director of Nedlloyd (EA), Mr. J. Schouten, closed down the shippingagency and transferred the shippingactivities to Wigglesworth Exporters Ltd. Only a skeleton staff of 5 remained active as owner’s representative for East Africa. All this meant that after half a century the Dutch landbased shipping activities in East Africa initiated by the Twentsche Overzeesche Handel Maatschappij and the Tangayika Boating Company handed over to Holland Afrika Lijn – Nedlloyd, came to an end. Formally the activities of Nedlloyd (EA) were restricted to being an owners’representative office for Eastern Africa with a skeleton staff of only five.. Template:Shipping Company
 |
This article is uncategorized. Please categorize this article to list it with similar articles. (May 2008) |
