From 15-person company to $6.5 billion shipping giant

Turkey Taking advantage of cheap assets during economic crisis, Yildirim grew from 15 employees to a shipping giant.

The combined net worth of the 10 richest shipping tycoons is $155 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, up from about $60 billion at the start of 2020. Prominent families in the industry are racing to invest, both to consolidate their position in the industry and to diversify into other areas.

Yildirim Holding (Türkiye) is a typical example. Thanks to its large cash reserves after the pandemic, they are preparing to spend $10 billion to invest in solar power, fertilizer plants in the US and other regions.

Yildirim Holding's success is largely due to the leadership of billionaire Robert Yuksel Yildirim, now 61. The middle son of the Yildirim family, which specializes in building materials, Robert has a master's degree in mechanical engineering from Oregon (USA).

Yldirim Holding CEO Robert Yuksel Yildirim. Photo: Yildirim Holding AS

His parents had previously agreed to send him to the US to study English on the condition that he return to Türkiye after three years. But he ended up staying longer in the US and taking a job at Mitsui Corporation in California, designing cranes for ports.

Five years after graduating, Robert returned to join his father's business, in the early 1990s, when the company had only 15 employees. With his contribution, the company quickly reached an agreement to import coal from Russia.

Robert first seized the opportunity of economic crisis about two decades ago. In 2004, he and the Yildirim brothers bought a bankrupt local fertilizer producer and a chromite miner. Both had collapsed during Turkey's 2001 debt crisis. "I've always accepted the challenge of doing something difficult if it has the potential to yield higher returns," Robert said.

His biggest bet came about 14 years ago. It was through the port business that Yildirim became acquainted with French container shipping giant CMA CGM. Led by founder Jacques Saade, CMA CGM was on the brink of collapse after the global financial crisis of 2008. The group was also a victim of the long-running cyclical downturn in the shipping industry, forcing it to renegotiate its debt and seek new capital.

As Yildirim’s second-generation CEO, Robert came to the rescue. The group’s subsidiary gave CMA CGM $500 million in exchange for a 20% stake. The deal gave Yildirim Holding three of the 10 seats on CMA CGM’s board. The stake was raised to 24% a few years later.

Scott Ashford, the dean of Oregon State Technical College who has known Yildirim for a decade, said the CEO values ​​relationships and is strategic in his thinking. “He always seems to be asking himself what his competitive advantage is,” Scott said.

Yildirim Holding has twice come close to selling its stake in CMA CGM. Once in 2015 and again in 2017, when it was considering buying US port operator Ports America Holdings.

The decision to retain the stake has paid off handsomely. Since the beginning of 2020, CMA CGM has paid out more than $4.9 billion in dividends, nearly a quarter of which has gone to Yildirim Holding. Last year alone, the CMA CGM stake earned the group $600 million in dividends.

It is by far Yildirim Holding’s largest asset, with a value of $6.7 billion, according to Bloomberg . Thanks to the CMA CGM deal, the Turkish conglomerate owns 20 ports. It is also the world’s second-largest producer of high-carbon ferrochrome, one of the largest chromium ore miners, and has operations in 56 countries.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, the global supply chain bottleneck has helped the shipping industry make a fortune, including Yildirim Holding. The value of the group has tripled in the past three years, making the Robert family billionaires.

But container freight rates have fallen 77% over the past year after soaring during the pandemic. Global rules limiting carbon emissions from ships are coming into force quickly, requiring costly upgrades and squeezing profits as cargo rates fall. The war in Ukraine and other geopolitical conflicts, as well as threats from criminal gangs, are adding to the pressure.

So CEO Robert Yildirim knows time is of the essence, and the company is launching a $10 billion investment plan that includes expansion into ammonia and urea plants in the U.S. and solar plants in Albania, Croatia, El Salvador, Kosovo and Turkey.

In addition, CEO Robert, already one of the world's largest container port operators, also intends to develop the port business. "We want to become one of the largest fruit port operators in the US," he said. Data from the US Department of Agriculture shows that the country imported $19.3 billion in fresh and frozen fruit last year.

Even before the pandemic unleashed the current wealth boom, Robert Yildirim had shown a penchant for diversification. Over the past six years, he has also invested $70 million in Turkish soccer club Samsunspor, which will win the second division this year, qualifying for the country’s top flight next season.

The Yildirim family business thrived, but it was also accompanied by internal strife. Robert had two brothers, Ali Riza and Mehmet. Mehmet died of a heart attack in 2017. So Robert and Ali Riza decided to buy out Mehmet's shares last year. They paid $150 million each to Mehmet's son and daughter, arguing that it was equivalent to the value of Mehmet's shares at the time of his death.

Mehmet’s daughter Cansu accepted. But her son Huseyin Can disagreed, claiming that the 16.7% stake he inherited was worth as much as $4.2 billion. In February 2023, he sued his two uncles. A local court dismissed the lawsuit in March, but the legal battle may not be over. Huseyin Can’s lawyers said he planned to appeal or refile the lawsuit after the court released the reasons for the rejection.

Such situations are common in wealthy families, especially those that have risen quickly, according to David Werdiger, a writer and adviser to family businesses. “Such disputes are often a manifestation of residual jealousy and resentment,” Werdiger says.

Phien An ( according to Bloomberg )

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