Maersk Line Shifts Asia HQ from Singapore to Hong Kong
By Aiswarya Lakshmi
Wednesday, February 3, 2016
As part of the organisational changes announced last year, Maersk Line has shifted its Asia head office to Hong Kong from Singapore, reducing the number of regional offices to seven from eight.
Maersk's two Asia regions, Asia Pacific and North Asia (China, Korea and Japan), have now become one. Prior to this merger, Hong Kong has already served as its North Asia headquarters since 2008.
Following the merger, Maersk's Singapore operations will become a country cluster office that will oversee its Southeast Asian operations, while its Hong Kong office will serve as the headquarters of its combined Asia-Pacific operations.
The HQ for the new Asia/Pacific region in Hong Kong will be headed by Robert van Trooijen.
In a statement to Shipping Watch, the carrier says: "This is part of the organisational changes following Maersk Line's announcement on 4 November 2015. Combining the two regions will enable simpler and more standardised processes. This will allow us to create a leaner organisation to operate with greater transparency and alignment on a regional, as well as cluster (sub-regional) level. We remain committed to the Asia Pacific region and will keep serving our customers through representation in all the countries we currently do business in within the region."
Lars Mikael Jensen, who had previously headed the Singapore office, will return to Maersk Line HQ in Copenhagen, Denmark to take up a management position within the operations department starting 1 February 2016.
Maersk Line, the world's largest, suffered last year from too many vessels just as global trade slumped. The container carrier expects to cut 4,000 of the total 23,000 on-land positions ahead of 2017 as digitalizations and organizational changes come into full effect.