The Woodlands, TX - We are pleased to announce the launch of dship Carriers (d.ship), a new ocean carrier. d.ship expands the Press family’s existing service portfolio in the logistics industry, alongside the deugro Group. Together, these two brands comprise a global organization with approximately 1,000 full-time employees in 35 countries, owned and managed by the third generation of the Press family, Thomas C. Press.
d.ship manages and operates a variety of multi-purpose breakbulk, heavy lift, and bulk vessels with capacities ranging from 5,000 DWAT to 50,000 DWAT, and combined crane capacities of up to 500 metric tons, allowing for a variety of fully customizable services. “We have witnessed a growing trend in the industry, whereby two similar product lines, project forwarding and project shipping, have started to diverge. As the industry has partly changed its business model and began to address its chartering needs directly with ocean carriers, and not through project freight forwarders, we too have adapted and are launching d.ship as a new project ocean carrier,” Mr. Press said. Both deugro and d.ship are fully independent in their operations; d.ship will develop its own business as a global ocean carrier, while the deugro Group will continue to focus on the traditional project forwarding business model, including chartering with ocean carriers that the company has valued and utilized during its 90 years of operation. This independence is important for each business model to succeed, but common ownership will nonetheless permit a seamless experience for each company's respective clients, where project forwarding and project shipping are managed separately. “d.ship is the perfect choice for a very sophisticated clientele, constantly looking for synergies in the supply chain,” Finn Rasmussen, President of dship Carriers (USA), Inc., said. The d.ship offices, strategically located in Houston, Tokyo, Singapore, and Bremen, will be staffed with industry experts in chartering, naval engineering, stowage planning, and other related maritime services. The Press family has over 90 years of business experience in the logistics and shipping industry. The deugro Group has provided logistics services since 1924, although its involvement in shipping began in the mid-1970s, when the family invested in its own heavy lift and RO/RO vessels. By 1987, the Press family was managing a diverse fleet of multi-purpose heavy lift vessels, offering liner services from the Mediterranean to Jeddah and other Red Sea ports, as well as regular sailings between France and Algeria with RO/RO vessels, while globally operating its multi-purpose fleet. Continuing the legacy today, dship Carriers will provide highly specialized ocean transportation solutions.