For the last couple of decades Manish Singh has extolled the positive effects of consolidation for shipping. As the CEO of Ocean Technologies Group for the last 15 months, Singh has practiced what he has preached, adding a diverse range of brands to the maritime learning group that today includes the likes of Seagull, Videotel, Coex and Marlins in its fast growing stable. The group is owned by private equity firm, Oakley Capital.
“Macro shocks like Covid or the global financial crisis amply demonstrate that even quality businesses perish, if they do not have scale efficiencies. Without these scale efficiencies, few make the considerable investment needed to stay future-ready,” says Singh, a man whose career in shipping started onboard working for Great Eastern Shipping back in 1993, and who is most associated with his 11-year tenure at V.Group.
Last year brought reliability into sharp focus, Singh says, with customers and users wanting demonstrable business continuity management and reliability from service providers.
“Quality operators are hesitating to work with partners that can’t demonstrate such resilience and reliability through future disruptions,” Singh tells Maritime CEO.
A holistic learning experience cannot rely fully either on in-person learning or on-line learning
A big recent development at the company has been the launch of the Ocean Learning Platform, designed to bring to life the extensive content and technological assets of Seagull and Videotel.
“The platform’s design philosophy works on users that are increasingly connected and interact with our learning product via personal devices to a larger extent than ever before,” Singh says.
The content has been unified under one library, but it has also been comprehensively overhauled using immersive technology like gamified content, micro-learning, role playing games and more.
While there’s still plenty in shipping who adamantly believe that training is better in person, Singh argues that the industry needs to accept new realities.
“We believe,” Singh says, “a holistic learning experience cannot rely fully either on in-person learning or on-line learning.”
The industry has got the ratio wrong, Singh argues.
“Presently as much as 90% of the effort and investment goes into a highly inefficient and unreliable mix of in-person training initiatives. We are leading the transition to a more equitable balance between brick and mortar training and digitally delivered learning and assessment,” Singh concludes.
