Crowley Maritime to restructure business units

The Jacksonville-based ocean carrier announced on Wednesday that it will restructure its business units into three main service lines.    Crowley Maritime will restructure of its business units in order to increase customer solutions, alignment of vessel operations and fuel distribution services and to focus on government-related business, the Jacksonville, Fla.-based ocean carrier said in a statement.
   Over the coming months, Crowley will transition its non-liner and logistics business units into three main service lines – Crowley Shipping, Crowley Fuels and Crowley Solutions, the carrier said. 
   Senior VP and General Manager Rob Grune will oversee Crowley Shipping, encompassing vessel ownership, operations, and management services, including deep sea petroleum transportation. Within vessel operations, Grune will oversee ship assist and escort services on the West Coast, as well as manage the offshore vessel, ocean-class tug and flat deck barge fleet. Commercial ship management,Crowley’s Commitment-Class ConRo ships and Crowley’s three tankers will also be under Grune’s purview. 
   Senior VP Rocky Smith will oversee Crowley Fuels and Crowley’s LNG sales, including the distribution and engineering unit and the company’s fuel sales and distribution business in Alaska. According to Crowley, “this alignment leverages the company’s expertise in transporting, storing and distributing various types of fuel across an expanded geographic footprint.”  
   Senior VP and General Manager Todd Busch will lead Crowley Solutions, which includes engineering and project management services, naval architecture and engineering through subsidiary Jensen Maritime, government vessel management, and a unified government business development team focused on delivering commercial solutions to government customers.
   “This plan facilitates a pivot towards growing the company’s government portfolio of work, building upon recent successes such as our recent $2.3 billion Defense Freight Transportation Services contract award and our current work with FEMA to bring much-needed supplies to Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands,” said Tom Crowley, company chairman and CEO. “The alignments within Crowley Shipping and Crowley Fuels better tie our markets, customers, processes and technology together to be more responsive, efficient and cost effective.”
   Crowley also noted that the liner shipping and logistics business units will continue to transition towards a singular supply chain solutions division – Crowley Logistics – over the next several years. Throughout the transition process, Crowley expects operations to remain “orderly and transparent.”