In 2008, Royal IHC’s engineering and production departments were predominantly Dutch. There was an urging need for international expansion, but the route was quite unpopular. A team of three people started to work on development of international production and engineering. This resulted in the successful outsourcing, management and turnkey delivery of many dredging and offshore vessels. These were delivered in China, India, Croatia and Bulgaria and lead to satisfied clients and excellent company results.
After five years of successfully leading the international shipbuilding, it was time to take the next step. The goal was to lead the complete dredging division and ultimately, all global shipbuilding activities. Restructuring, integrating business units and reorganizing the business heavily featured this period. It had to be transformed into an efficient and effective global shipbuilding operation, managing a portfolio of, on average, 20 shipbuilding and dredging installation projects and 1500+ employees around the globe. Key to the success of all activities: setting clear expectations and goals, resolute decision making and managing for result, without losing focus on the human element.