Takeovers of public shipping companies often see top management head for the exit door, but that is not the case in Saltchuk Resources’ acquisition of Overseas Shipholding Group.
OSG chief executive Sam Norton confirmed to TradeWinds that the plan is for him to remain at the helm of the US-flag tanker owner after the transaction closed on Wednesday.
“No specific timeline has been prescribed, although the intention on all sides is that this will not be [a] short-term position,” he said in an email to TradeWinds.
“As much as one can predict the future, it would be my intention to continuing working for some time to come.”
As part of the transaction, which put Florida’s OSG at an enterprise value of $950m, the board resigned, but Norton was subsequently appointed as a director, securities filing show.
The company also notified the New York Stock Exchange that it was delisting in the take-private deal as it became Seattle-based Saltchuk’s seventh business unit in a diversified maritime conglomerate.
Saltchuk chairman Mark Tabbutt said on Wednesday that OSG would remain a stand-alone company operating independently.
“We look forward to working alongside the OSG team as we move forward together,” he said.
Top management continuity at OSG contrasts with Star Bulk Carriers’ takeover of Eagle Bulk Shipping in April, in which chief executive Gary Vogel stepped down.
But Star Bulk already had an executive team that ran a fleet of bulkers, while Saltchuk’s takeover of OSG has been seen as further diversification of a company with no tanker exposure.
Norton was named chief executive and president of OSG in 2016, shortly after the company spun off its non-US-flag tanker fleet as International Seaways.
That was only months after he was appointed head of the US-flag strategic business unit.
He joined the OSG board in August 2014, at the conclusion of the company’s reorganisation under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
Before that, he was chief executive of container ship owner SeaChange, which he co-founded in 2006 after decades in Ofer family companies, where he was a senior executive at Idan Ofer’s Tanker Pacific Management and led the Sammy Ofer Group’s entry into the container ship segment.
