There’s a lot of talk these days about the digitalization of the shipping industry. The Greek ship owning community is looking to take advantage of this trend and keep pioneering the industry. As such, Hanseatisoft, one of the leading companies in that respect and hot of the heels of its partnership with Llody’s Register is in the process of establishing its office in Greece. In an exclusive interview, Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide (www.hellenicshippingnews.com) talked with the company’s CEO, Mr. Alexander Buchmann, regarding his future plans.
Lloyd’s Register recently agreed a deal with Hanseaticsoft? Can you provide some details as to the nature of this agreement? Has LR bought a stake in the company, or is it more project-oriented?
Hanseaticsoft is owned by Mr Alexander Buchmann and Lloyds Register recently acquired a minority share of the company, as both companies share the same vision of what cloud-based fleet management should look like in the future. Both companies complete each other from a strategic standpoint. Hanseaticsoft is not connected to any shipowner or ship-manager.
How did they approach you and which is the main scope of the investment? Can you provide us with some financials behind it?
Lloyds Register has seen a golden opportunity to get access to one of the leading providers of cloud based management solutions on the market, which was the right fit for their current digitalisation strategy. We got approached directly. Financial information is confidential.
Which will be the future plans of this new endeavour?
The plan is to open 3 more offices within a year in Athens, Singapore and Dubai. Athens will be the second office abroad for Hanseaticsoft. We recently opened our first office in Copenhagen, Denmark. We will continue to leverage on the broad network Lloyds Register has in the maritime industry and work with our partner hand in hand and share our ideas about digitalisation of vessels and shipping companies in the future.
You mentioned Hanseaticsoft’s plans to create an office in Athens. Can you let us know the reasoning behind this move and how it’s been progressing?
Despite the many domestic and market challenges facing the Greek ship owning community, Greece has continued to strengthen its position as the world’s largest ship owning nation. Greek ship-owners today control some 18% of the world fleet. Since the Greek shipping companies have always been traditional but still open-minded towards new trends, we are certain that they will recognise the great potential that modern software solutions can offer them, if they haven’t already done so.
Alexander Buchmann
With Greek ship owners notoriously demanding and cost-conscious, how do you plan to approach them, in terms of convincing them about the importance of your products to their daily business operations?
We hire Greek people who have a proven history and experience in the shipping industry, thus know the market and players in them. We know that our product revolutionises the traditional way of doing ship-management and since we have already been approached by some Greek ship owners we are certain that we will get a chance to demonstrate our solution to more companies. Most shipping companies are currently looking for solutions to modernise their processes, we are very happy that we have a lot to offer in this field.
We will take the experience we have gained from our many existing customers in other markets but are prepared for the unknown and are ready to do some things differently than we have before. It is a challenge, but we love what we do and can´t wait to demonstrate it.
Technology is considered to be the main driver of shipping’s future innovations. Where will Hanseaticsoft be in this newly developing domain? Do you think that shipping is an industry which is easily adopting new technologies, or is it more cautious than other sectors?
We are the early adopters of our industry which has given us the competitive edge. We consider ourselves as front-runners. Many have been thinking the cloud thought, the difference is we that are not only thinking we are acting on it, and have done so from the get-go when we started our business back in 2009.
Shipping may be a bit conservative but ship-owners and ship-managers are more and more grasping the true costs of not adapting. Our experiences during the last years have shown us that the digital revolution is on its way and the shipping industry has realised this by including new ways of handling their daily business. Those who will adapt to the changes with digitalisation of their businesses and fleets will stay in the game and ahead of competition and we want to assist them with exactly that.
Nikos Roussanoglou, Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide