Theodoros Profantis

Biography: 

Ever since I was attending my Bachelor's degree in Economics at the University of Macedonia, I had decided to be involved in the Maritime industry. I was motivated by its competitive nature, given my country's long-time tradition in the above field. Since September 2019, I have been attending the MSc Maritime Policy and Shipping Management of the Business School of Cardiff University, where I have been taught key courses such as Maritime Economics, Maritime Policy, Maritime Law, Shipping Management & Finance and, Ship Chartering. I am confident that these courses and the several assignments and projects that I worked on, have provided me with the knowledge on policy and management needed to deal with maritime issues and understand how the shipping industry and market work. I am currently finishing my dissertation and I am searching for career opportunities.

Introduction to research:

The research objective of this dissertation is to analyze through discussion the future challenges for container shipping and the dynamic changes after an extensive review of the container shipping industry and classification of the literature review has been conducted. As such, there will be some research questions that will lead to the answer to the research aim.

First of all, how alliances, mergers, and acquisitions change the industry's dynamics in a good or a wrong way. Secondly, connected to the first matter, how mega-ships exploit economies of scale? Does the effectiveness of economies of scale get weaker with the upsizing of ships and how to solve?

Moreover, in current days, there is a need for optimization of port locations, which creates high port competitiveness. Mega-ships force container terminals to make changes in their facilities as there is a need for new technologies and innovation to achieve more efficient cargo-handling and avoid port congestion. Because of mammoth-ships, it is clear that there is a higher cost both in time and in money to handle a container on arriving on this type of ship, occurring "port diseconomy of scale".

Furthermore, the expansion of the Panama Canal has been also a challenge for US ports, that is impossible one studying the current and the future condition of the market to ignore the impact of it.

Finally, investigation of how digitalization can help the shipping industry takes place in the dissertation and its challenges are analyzed. As such, objectives such as port modernization, automation, Blockchain Technology and sharing real time analyzed data are discussed.

What is your interest in or the practical applications of this research?

The motivation of this dissertation is to determine and analyse through discussion, the future of the container shipping and how digitalization will promote productivity by enabling the elimination of inefficiencies. The container-shipping industry has to keep up with digital reinvention in order to deal with the dynamic challenges of the global trade. All the parties of this industry, either shipping companies or port authorities, have to face strategic dilemmas and take some “no regret moves” in order to achieve future flexibility. That is the basic idea of this dissertation. In detail, the paper aims to provide shareholders with some thoughts about investments, and answer questions such as how will value be created in the near future and who will eventually win through these challenges.

Why did you choose maritime as your area of study and research?

While I was attending my Bachelor’s Degree, Economic Sciences, I was thinking of potential future careers and through searching and discussion I decided that I wanted to get involved in the shipping field. First of all, the competitive nature of this sector has intrigued me. I believe that anyone who wants to be successful in this industry has to understand how the market works and be able to be adaptive on the changes and deal with all the challenges that may occur. In detail, my visions for the future are to become a broker and be able to offer high quality services to my clients. I believe that it is a very competitive job and that anyone has to stand out in order to be at the top level.