WMS(B): Restructuring Post Unitor Acqusition

Abstract

In May 2005, the Wilh Wilhelmsen (WW) group took the decision of acquiring Unitor. The price was settled at 73.5 NOK. Despite obvious complementarity, it wasn’t an easy decision. The acquisition had posed major challenges due to diversity in geographies, systems, products and markets. It was anticipated that this move would, mainly, help strengthen the ship’s service area of Wilhelmsen Maritime Services (WMS) due to Unitor’s impressive systems. The challenge at hand was the integration post merger, especially in the back drop of an earlier integration process of the two main divisions of WMS, namely, Barwil (ship services at port) and Barber International (ship management services).The efforts for integrating the two had to cut across culture, systems, structure and people. As integrating initiatives, WW academy offered workshops to the employees of both WMS and Unitor with global themes including inputs on the values, common goals, strategy, new communication, IT systems etc. A climate survey was designed to explore staff perceptions around the WW values.This case focuses on how the post merger reality unfolded and where was WMS in 2006 with regard to the kind of development that was expected.