Thome Sees Value in Move to Manila (31 October 2007, Lloyd's List)

Thome Ship Management is expanding its presence in the Philippines, using the country as its regional headquarters.

Earlier this year Singapore-based Thome opened a new $2m regional headquarters and training facility in the capital Manila. While the head office remains in Singapore, the Manila regional headquarters takes over many of the back-office functions that have, in the past, taken place in Singapore.

The majority of functions are accounting and around half of the procurement department. “These functions can be done easily here,” says Ivar Thomasli, managing director of Thome’s regional office headquarters.

With its own building in Makati, the shipmanager does not have to worry about the cost of space and says it is easier to find employees compared to Singapore’s extremely tight job market. In recent years key areas such as IT infrastructure have also improved tremendously. “It’s a cost issue but also we have our own building here,” explains Capt Thomasli.

Staff from the Manila office are sent to Singapore for between two to four months of training to bring them up to speed with the company’s processes. With its new building, Thome has also made a major commitment to training with a view to ensuring it has enough qualified senior crew for the future.

“The senior officer shortage affectseveryone,” says Capt Thomasli. “We, as with the rest in shipping, are faced with the lack of senior officers. That is why we focus on doing our own training. We are looking to promote as many people as possible.”

This, combined with the company’s own reputation, means that so far it has been able to manage the situation.

“So far we have been able to find senior officers. We have been quite busy and have a good reputation,” he says. “A big cadet programme, that is one of the most important things.” The manager itself has around 400 cadets in the pipeline, graduating around 100 a year.

He says that there is no easy way around the problem and simply paying more will not provide solution.

Thome’s own training centre features bridge, engine and cargo-handling simulators. However, the manager still needs to use outside training centres as well and works closely with a number of schools.

The aim is both to train future seafarers and to retain existing ones, so in a few years’ time the company will be self-sufficient. “This is why we are working to train our seafarers and promote them,” says Capt Thomasli.

The manager currently has around 5,000 seafarers from the Philippines on its books, with between 3,500-4,000 sailing at any one time.