News

From FR8 to NAVIG8

Navig8 Ltd (Navig8) has been incorporated in March 2007 by the ex-Management of FR8 Group following the recent split from Projector SA, Belize.

Navig8, a Jersey company with initial equity capital of approx. $50 million, will manage a substantial Product Tanker fleet out of offices strategically located London, Singapore, USA and Mumbai.

Recent M&A activity within the group resulted in the Management selling its asset interests to Projector, while maintaining the full ownership and control in the management companies; Navig8 will consolidate under its wings the commercial management and brokerage arms, FR8 Logistics (London) and FR8 Services (Singapore). Furthermore, Navig8 has agreed to acquire FR8 Shipmanagement Pte Ltd (to be renamed Navig8 Shipmanagement Pte Ltd), which will remain the group’s technical management arm.

Our Management team hasn’t changed; chartering will be covered by Max Curtis, Paul Delaney and Ugo Romano in the west, while Peder Moller and Richard Lewis will cover the east. Nicolas Busch and Mark Lyons will risk manage the group’s portfolio and trade on the derivatives markets. Projects will continue being developed by Gary Brocklesby and Henry Tse, with Modi Mano managing the group’s investment and finance activities. Capt. Debashish Bhattacharya will head technical management and operations. Overall, Navig8 employs a strong team of about 40 people.

The company has been set-up with an initial equity injection of approx. $50 million and is in discussions with banks and investors regarding further capitalization in the order of $150-200 million. Navig8 has ownership interests in a number of modern MR tankers with an aggregate market value circa $200 million.

Navig8 has signed Commercial & Technical Management agreements for the FR8 Fleet, currently counting 28 vessels and an exclusive brokerage agreement for Projector SA cargoes. Navig8 expects to grow the fleet through provision of high quality management services (commercial and technical) to third parties and joint ventures, while expanding its proprietary fleet of modern MR and LR tankers. Navig8 takes principal positions as time-charter operator and owner and will continue trading FFA’s and other derivatives with the purpose of hedging, exploiting arbitrage opportunities and taking a speculative view on the market.

Following the successful completion of the fleet sale Gary Brocklesby, the group’s leader has announced that: “We have had a great track-record since we launched our business model in 2003; we have consistently outperformed the product tanker markets by significant margins, we set-up a state of the art technical management team, who successfully took delivery of four tankers and are overseeing the construction of a further 11 vessels. Our objective remains to be an innovative player in the product tanker sphere, integrating time-charter trading and ship owning with active trading of freight and oil derivatives, through the employment and development of unique risk management technology.” The Management intends to step-up its growth strategy through taking proprietary positions (TC’s and S&P) in combination with joint-ventures with financial investors, oil traders and shipping companies – a strategy that proved to be successful in the past.

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