Bremen: One of the world’s newest shipowners, Bremen-based Zeaborn jumped into the news last week confirming an order for ten multipurpose vessels, something our Chinese sister site SinoShip News reported a month ago. The 12,500 dwt ships will be built at China’s Taizhou Sanfu Ship Engineering, and will be delivered in three-month intervals as from the fourth quarter 2015. The heavylift vessels have two tower slewing cranes, each having a lifting capacity of 250 tons.
Founded in April last year, Zeaborn describes itself as a global integrated shipping company operating in the MPP segment and meeting capital market requirements. Zeaborn covers the entire value chain of a modern shipping company, from financing through to commercial and technical management up to the freighting of its own or chartered vessels.
Founders Jan-Hendrik Többe and Ove Meyer tell Maritime CEO they are “open” to strategic partnerships and acquisitions.
“At Zeaborn,” Többe says, “our focus is on the attractive niche market of the heavy-cargo segment within the shipping industry. Our aim is to establish a market-relevant fleet, reaching critical mass in terms of size via our newbuild programs, suitable existing vessels as well as chartered MPP vessels.”
The first series of vessels is built on what Meyer describes as a “conservative” debt financing with German banks and an institutional investor. The relevant equity is provided from Zeaborn’s cornerstone investor and majority shareholder, Kurt Zech. Zech runs a large construction, real estate and hotel group also headquartered in Bremen.
Prior to co-founding Zeaborn, Meyer guided the expansion of BBC Chartering for nine years as part of its management team while Többe was a partner at Roland Berger Strategy Consultants and PricewaterhouseCoopers. [16/04/14]
