Press Release: Ross Martin COO takes the helm as Founder moves to Group Executive Chair.
Founded in 2009, StratumFive has grown from a bootstrapped tech company in Brighton, UK, to become category king in voyage informatics, serving a global client base of 13,500 vessels with a full suite of routing, monitoring, and analytic applications from its UK, US, and NZ offices. This period of sustained growth and development has brought about a host of internal changes, and prompted a leadership transition as the company continues to move forward aggressively.
Ross Martin has worked his way up through the ranks via numerous positions in sales, marketing, and product development and, ten years after joining StratumFive, is perfectly placed to take over as CEO. He will continue to deliver rapid growth following the successful launch of the award winning voyage informatics platform, Podium5. Many shipowners are starting to take advantage of increasing connectivity and data availability on Podium5 to drive performance improvement and reduce emissions.
“The time is right for this change as we enter the era of transformation in the way owners use operational data to make shipping safer, cleaner, and more efficient. This premeditated move to appoint a new leader with the energy to capitalise on our investment during these exciting times ensures the company is positioned for further growth.
At StratumFive we have always done things differently. Over the last three years we have taken positive, proactive steps and invested in a dynamic executive team to build on our legacy success. This exciting promotion reflects the recognition of the talent within the company, and is the start of a new chapter in its continued growth. Ross understands the market direction and client needs and has been instrumental in developing Podium5.” said Stuart Nicholls, Founder and Group Executive Chair.
Originally serving the shipping industry with security and tracking services, StratumFive quickly grew its client base and within a decade was the leading provider of many solutions required by the Safety of Life at Sea regulations (SOLAS). Three years ago it started to invest energy into reconciling the avalanche of data streams coming from connected vessels. This resulted in a number of acquisitions, including FleetWeather ocean routing, and connecting all the dots of a “digitalized voyage” delivered through a single platform and connected suite of applications.
“Our team has worked hard to ensure we delivered a competitive solution that allows all operational departments in a shipowner’s office to all work from a central collaborative system, reducing data duplication and minimizing unconnected legacy services. We have also significantly grown our connected data integration partner community, giving the owners a frictionless solution to harmonise all their data inputs into meaningful outputs that were stalling the benefits of the big data revolution” said new CEO Ross Martin.
“It is a great honour to take the StratumFive baton from Stuart Nicholls, and I thank him and all the leadership team for their support. Now as we move ahead in such exciting times for shipping, I look forward to leading our team in connecting even more data applications to help shipowners to drive their business forward”, added Martin.
