Scorpio Group is led by two of shipping’s outsized personalities, Emanuele Lauro and Robert Bugbee.
But a third executive with a decidedly lower profile is typically in the middle of any important initiative the Monaco-based group undertakes.
This story is one of 30 profiles in a special edition of our TW+ magazine.
To celebrate TradeWinds’ 30th birthday, TW+ is not looking back, but forward, with a Thirty@30 focus on the important people and issues extending out to 2050.
TradeWinds reporters have profiled 30 personalities who have shown traits that we think mean they will influence the directions the shipping industry takes, maybe not quite as far forward as the next 30 years, but certainly over the next decade.
Read all the profiles when TW+ is published on 16 October.
Whether it’s developing a programme for exhaust gas scrubbers or transitioning from bulkers to wind turbine installation vessels, Cameron Mackey’s name is one to know.
The chief operating officer is the quiet man behind the activity of the private group and its public companies: Scorpio Tankers, Scorpio Bulkers and Hermitage Offshore Services. He generally avoids the public spotlight, but makes an exception to speak to TW+.
“Emanuele and Robert are two very talented commercial people who work exceedingly well together,” he says of his role in the group.
“I don’t think they’d take it personally if I were to say that neither is as strong on actual process. So in support of this dynamic duo, I try — with some successes and some failures — to keep my hand on the tiller of all the different business activities.”
The 52-year-old knows about having a hand on the tiller. He dreamt of going to sea as a child staring out from his summer vacation home in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, part of Cape Cod.
“I’m one of those guys who wanted to get involved with shipping since I was five or six. Some want to be a fireman or a policeman, I wanted to be a ship’s captain,” he recalls.
As soon as he was old enough to start working, he spent time on tugs and commercial fishing boats. “I was one of those wharf rats.”
Princeton grad
Still, a change might have been understandable when the chance came to attend the elite Princeton University, from which he received a bachelor’s degree in political science/government in 1991.
“I had some time to reflect and thought, ‘Gosh, I’m still not done with my aspirations to be in shipping’.”
There’s a lot to learn and accomplish. The leap from a shipping company to a marine engineering firm is probably the biggest we could ever take
Cameron Mackey
This led to a second bachelor’s degree in marine transportation from Massachusetts Maritime Academy in 1994 and a third-mate’s licence.
From a tough job market initially, Mackey worked his way up to bluewater positions, ultimately serving as a master mariner with Mobil Oil tankers.
He next pursued an MBA degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 2001 to 2003, but confounded administrators when he told them he didn’t want a summer internship in finance, but in shipping. “We don’t know anyone in shipping,” was the response.
Mackey sent out his CV to many household names. The only reply came from the former OMI Corp in Stamford, Connecticut.
When Mackey arrived for an interview, it quickly became apparent he had been “hired”, in effect, not by Bugbee but his long-time executive assistant, Shanaz Sattaur, who liked his resume.
The rest, essentially, is history. Mackey was formally retained upon completing his MBA and ultimately rose to senior vice president in charge of technical operations when the company was sold for $2.2bn in 2007.
Mackey went with Bugbee and Sattaur to the hedge fund Ospraie Management for a year before the team connected with Lauro in 2009 and joined Scorpio. Scorpio Tankers went public in 2010 and Scorpio Bulkers in 2013.
More recently, he spearheaded the group’s decision to install scrubbers on more than 100 vessels, and has been heavily involved in Scorpio Bulkers’ plans to enter the wind turbine installation vessel market.
“It’s not shipping, it’s marine engineering,” Mackey says of the offshore wind play. “There’s a lot to learn and accomplish. The leap from a shipping company to a marine engineering firm is probably the biggest we could ever take.”
A deep thinker on industry issues, Mackey worries about increased regulatory complexity.
“Shipping really should be a rather simple business, but it’s getting increasingly complicated.
“The challenge is not forming an idea, but navigating this incredibly complicated set of constituents and constraints with that idea. The complexity is holding our industry back, not moving it forward.”
But, he adds, he is “lucky to be part of a fantastic team that thrives on challenges”.
