Location of Shipping Companies

This chapter investigates the choice of location of shipping firms as one of the key strategic and operational decisions for the shipping business. The topic has not received to date apt attention and scholarly research interest. We explore the potential role of the nationality of ship ownership and registration in explaining the choice of place for establishment of ship management. Other factors indicated by the literature are also controlled for and included in the study. Our cross-sectional analysis, using a multiple regression econometric approach, considers all major ship owning, ship registry and ship management countries. Our empirical findings suggest that nationality of ship ownership and registration determine ship management location. However, the significance of the two explanatory variables differs according to the management’s unit of measurement (deadweight capacity versus number of ships). Our analysis proposes an interesting area for further research.