Successful premiere for the German-Swedish Port Event. SCHRAMM Ports & Logistics and Söderhamns Stuveri & Hamn presented themselves together with Hafen Hamburg Marketing and PORT OF KIEL at an information event in Stockholm. Expansion of the port of Orrskär planned in Söderhamn.
More than 80 guests followed the invitation on Thursday to the traditional Operakällaren in the heart of Stockholm for an event that took place in this form for the first time. The operators from Brunsbüttel and Söderhamn as well as Hamburg and Kiel already have close ties with the Swedish ports or are even active as port operators in Sweden. They jointly organized the first German-Swedish Port Event with the goal of exchanging information with customers, representatives from the maritime industry, shippers, industrial companies as well as administration and politics.
SCHRAMM Ports & Logistics Sweden AB (SPL Sweden), a wholly owned subsidiary of Brunsbüttel Ports GmbH, part of the SCHRAMM group, has been a majority shareholder in Söderhamns Stuveri & Hamn AB (SSHAB) since 2017. The Swedish company is an operator and / or logistics service provider at a total of six port terminals in the Söderhamn region, around 200km north of Stockholm.
Frank Schnabel, Managing Director of the SCHRAMM group and CEO of SPL Sweden, explained to the interested guests the motivation of the SCHRAMM group as a medium-sized German company to take the entrepreneurial step to Sweden and how the strategic orientation of the group will be in Sweden. Afterwards, Peter Wikman, CEO of SSHAB, presented the ports in Söderhamn in detail and presented the detailed expansion plans for the port of Orrskär.
"After more than two years, we can confirm that it was the absolute right decision to take the entrepreneurial step to Sweden. The Swedish mentality and corporate culture of SSHAB is very similar to ours and we have already learned a lot from each other, "says Schnabel.
As owners, operators and logistics service providers at various port terminals in Brunsbüttel, Hamburg, Glückstadt and Rendsburg, the port group of the SCHRAMM group had focused its activities on the North Sea ports in northern Germany until 2017. "We deliberately wanted to expand our port group with locations in the Baltic Sea region, because we are convinced of the market. At the same time, one of our preconditions was that the ports and the new company fit in with the philosophy of the SCHRAMM group. With SSHAB, we have found the ideal supplement for our company- and port group ", continues Schnabel. After SCHRAMM group has successfully gained a foothold in Scandinavia, Schnabel does not exclude an expansion of activities in Sweden beyond Söderhamn: "We keep our eyes open and watch the market. If there is an opportunity to operate additional ports or to provide maritime logistics services, we will consider this. But even in Söderhamn itself we already have plans for expansion. " The largest of the six port locations in Söderhamn is the port of Orrskär. About 1 million cubic meters of sawn timber from around 45 sawmills are loaded per year via Orrskär. This makes the port a central hub in Sweden for the export of sawn timber. Wood products are today the mainstay of the ports in Söderhamn. "Our strategy in Orrskär is to expand the transshipment of wood products while also gaining new cargo and customers. Similar to our ports in Brunsbüttel, we also want to develop the Swedish ports into multipurpose ports. In order to make this possible, we are currently planning the expansion of the port together with the municipality of Söderhamn", Schnabel explains the plans. "The expansion of the port provides the construction of a third berth for ships up to 200m in length and 11m draft, as well as the creation of additional two hectares of storage space", explains Peter Wikman the planned expansion in detail. "The planning is already well advanced, the necessary approval from the authorities is available".
With the construction of the third berth and the additional purchase of at least one mobile harbor crane, the capacity and efficiency of the port will be further increased, both for the handling of timber products and for new cargo. A growing market in Sweden, for which the port also wants to position itself in the market with the expansion of the port, is the handling of wind turbines. "The handling of wind turbines would be an ideal example of how we can use the extensive know-how in our port group also across borders. In Brunsbüttel we have many years of experience in handling wind turbines and their components, which we can pass on to our Swedish colleagues, "Schnabel reports. The first edition of the German-Swedish Port Event was a great success from the point of view of the organizers and the guests. The exchange between the guests showed that the economic interdependence of both countries is close and strong and has a positive effect on the ports. Looking to the future is more than confident. A second edition of the event format in the coming year is likely after the successful premiere.