Burgess Marine joins forces with Global Services
Britain’s largest independent ship repairer and marine engineering services provider Burgess Marine has today completed the acquisition of Exeter-based superyacht procurement specialist Global Services and its sister company Global New Builds.
The acquisition of Global – based at 28 Trade City in Apple Lane – is Burgess Marine’s fifth to date and its second since RJD Partners’ private equity investment in February of last year.
Nicholas Warren, the chief executive of Burgess Marine said: “Whilst on paper this is an acquisition the operational reality is far, far closer to that of a merger.
“We’ll be taking the best bits of both the businesses and putting them together to the benefit of our customers.
“It’s very much business as usual for the Global team – branding, market position, strategy and personnel won’t change.
“That said, over a period of time we’ll definitely be pulling the two companies closer together and moving our own existing procurement business together with Global’s.”
Burgess Marine already handles circa £2.2m per annum of procurement purchasing for the commercial marine and cruise ship sectors, which will eventually sit within the Global Services business.
The combined business will also benefit from further synergies due to the fact that Global’s principle procurement channel is that of marine engineering components and Burgess Marine’s core skill is the provision of marine engineering services; thereby providing an enhanced service offering to customers
Nicholas said: “There are a phenomenal amount of opportunities to not only increase the portfolio of the individual businesses but to also benefit the whole.
“Our intent is three-fold. We’d like to deliver both internal efficiencies to our category managers and external savings to our customers by adopting the state-of-the-art software forming Global’s purchasing backbone; we’d like to promote more Superyacht refits to both our Portchester and Palma footprints; and we’d like to offer customers that buy engineering components from Global a full turn-key service including onsite support and installation.”
He added: “We’ll also be using this merger to expand both our agency network and our offering within the Superyacht sector.
“We’ve completed some pretty big yacht projects in recent years to include works on-board the likes of MY Bystander, MY Shemara, MY Amaryllis, MY Alamshar, MY iDynasty and MY Lady A, and I am genuinely looking forward to building our name, reputation and service offering further within the Superyacht space.”
Richard Gardiner, the founder and managing director of Global, will be staying within the newly expanded broader business for the foreseeable future.
Richard said: “The Burgess Marine Global tie-up is great news for so many reasons.
“We fit, we have a plan, and both parties add tremendous value to each other. The synergies are clear and genuine with the obvious benefits being achievable.
“Having taken Global literally from the garden shed to a major trade sale I am extremely proud of all that we have achieved and I am extremely excited about what the future now holds for the bigger business.”
Global are based in Exeter, Devon, UK. Burgess Marine are based in Dover, Kent, UK.
Financial details of the transaction were undisclosed.
