Maritime business software company Marcura has acquired ShipServ, a digital marketplace platform focused on ships’ spares, provisions and services.
Shipserv is the largest platform for connecting suppliers with vessel operators online, and it handles about $6 billion in transaction volume per year. It serves 300 buyer companies in all different shipping segments, and prominent customers include Gaslog, Shell, Wilhelmsen, Holland America Line and Solstad. It also hosts the IMPA catalogue guide for marine stores, a comprehensive list of 50,000 products for shipboard use.
Marcura adds ShipServ’s 126 employees to its own staff of 850, and brings its customer base up to 800 maritime buyers and 47,000 suppliers around the world. It expects that the merger will complement Marcura’s own services in payments processing and procurement, bring together more expertise and a bigger portfolio of digital services for maritime operators. In many cases, the acquisition will allow Marcura to serve different departments within the same shipping companies it already counts among its customers.
«The combination of Marcura and ShipServ creates an industry-leading vertical software, data, payments and procurement platform focused on the maritime sector. Our extensive blue-chip customer base spans the world’s largest commodity shipping, container and cruise line organizations,» said Marcura Group CEO Jens Poulsen.
ShipServ will continue to operate as a separate company and maintain its own brand identity. The price of the transaction was not disclosed.
According to ShipServ CEO Henrik Hyldahn, the integration will allow the trade platform to incorporate Marcura’s features, including payments processing, proprietary know-your-customer (KYC) compliance data, and settlement workflow. «We can offer solutions to the industry’s growing need for digitalisation, efficiency and compliance,» Hyldahn said. Meanwhile, Marcura will be able to integrate ShipServ’s pricing data and logistics monitoring tools into its existing platform.