Heidmar has made the first hire in what is to become a stand-alone, dedicated sale-and-purchase advisory desk within the company.
The pools and ship-management operator announced in a LinkedIn post on Monday that it has hired experienced S&P broker Stelios Landrakis for its Athens office.
Landrakis has more than 11 years of experience in this arena, working in similar positions at Advanced Shipping & Trading, Shiptrade Services and Allied Shipbroking.
His appointment marks the formal launch of Heidmar’s S&P desk, the company said.
“It’s a start — one person is not a desk, so we’re looking at more people as well,” chief executive Pankaj Khanna told TradeWinds.
According to Khanna, Heidmar has been informally involved in S&P-related activities for about two years now and already has a few deals under its belt.
“Now we’re starting a desk. Stelios will be closely working with me to service our clients,” he said.
However, Khanna is careful to stress that the idea is not to operate in competition with established broking houses — “This is not the intention”.
Rather, the plan is to provide one additional service to clients.
Heidmar said Landrakis would “understand clients’ mindset, identify the right opportunities and engage into commercial negotiations for selling or buying secondhand vessels”.
This means Heidmar aims to leverage existing pool experience and special relationships with charterers and commercial managers to help value ships and facilitate S&P deals.
“There’s a lot of things we can add to the picture,” Khanna said.
In March, the Athens and London-based firm outlined expansion plans ahead of a Nasdaq listing.
Heidmar is pursuing a merger with blank-cheque company Home Plate Acquisition Corp in which it will take over the Nasdaq listing of its new partner.
