Charting a global path for maritime innovation
TS Maritime Sdn Bhd founder and chief executive officer Captain Ahmad Kamal Kamarudin and his team had double reason to celebrate recently as the company won two awards at the inaugural Export Excellence Awards 2019.
The company, which bagged a Gold Award in the Small and Medium Enterprises category, also clinched one of three exclusive Exporter of the Year awards.
Established in 1996, TS Maritime has evolved and diversified from its origins as a provider of management and consultancy services into ship management services and operations and maintenance in the maritime industry.
Speaking to press after the event - organised by the Star Media Group in partnership with Standard Chartered Bank Malaysia – Kamal expressed his gratitude to The Star and its organising partners, as well as to the judges, saying, “I feel honoured to receive these awards.”
Flanked by team members from his company, Kamal added, “We believe these awards are recognition of our hard work, as the company has been around for 23 years, and I would like to thank all the staff – it is their hard work and their dedication that has allowed us to win this award.”
The company, along its journey, began exporting marine vessels in 2004 to countries such as Indonesia, the Maldives and to countries in east Africa.
Among other developments, TS Maritime is currently collaborating with an agent in the Maldives to explore the use of hybrid marine vessels for Maldivian waters.
All about the teamwork: Kamal (centre), who received the award for TS Maritime as Exporter of the Year in the SME category, thanked his team for their hard work.
“Our team’s hard work has produced the design of our vessel, the small waterplane area twin hull (known by its acronym Swath), for which we had an order late last year,” elaborated Kamal.
He added, “We are building one for the Maldivian tourism industry, and this vessel can also be used in the Malaysian tourism industry.”
Moreover, he noted that the Swath could also be used in the oil and gas industry during the months of the northeast monsoon season in order to “help the industry improve on their non-productive time.”
TS Maritime’s other achievements also include innovative design for various iterations of the Swath vessel, to the point that in 2018, the design reached the top five finalists stage in the Malaysian Oil and Gas Service Council Innovation Awards.
“It is the belief of all our teams that we have to keep rebranding and reinventing ourselves, especially in the shipping industry,” he said, “because the industry is cyclical; we have to be innovative and we have to adapt.”
The company has also introduced Steel Dhonis to the Maldives market, adding yet another innovative export-driven accomplishment to their list of Malaysianmade global accomplishments.