MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Navios launches South American logistics business

Navios storage port in Nueva Palmira

Bulk transportation company Navios Maritime Holdings Inc. said it has formed a South American logistics business by combining its existing port operation in Uruguay with the barge and upriver port businesses operated by the Horamar Group.

Navios said the transaction included a $112.2 million payment for 63.8 percent of the combined entity, named Navios South American Logistics Inc. Former Horamar Group stockholders own the remaining 36.2 percent. The deal creates "an end-to-end logistics business, which leverages Navios' transshipment facility in Uruguay with an upriver port facility in Paraguay and dry and wet barge capacity," said Angeliki Frangou, Navios' chairman and chief executive officer. "We are pleased with the business partnership we have formed with the Lopez family, the principal shareholders of Horamar. We believe that by blending our businesses, we will develop the critical mass necessary for us to become a significant regional player." The Horamar Group, established in 1975, provides transport and storage of liquid cargoes and transport of dry bulk cargoes along the Hidrovia passing through Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay. It controls a fleet of more than 100 barges and vessels, including 13 push boats, 55 dry barges, 42 tank barges, three LPG tank barges, two self-propelled barges, two small oil tankers, a handysize tanker and two docking platforms. The group also owns and operates an upriver oil storage and transfer facility in Paraguay The group is in the process of expanding its cabotage business, involving the restricted coastal transport of oil within a single country. As part of its expansion efforts, the group recently took delivery of one handysize oil tanker and will take delivery of another in 2008. Horamar's clients include well-known petroleum and agricultural companies, including Bunge, Cargill, Glencore, Shell Argentina, Shell Paraguay, Exxon Mobil, Molinos, Vicentin, Petrobras, Petropar, Repsol YPF, Repsol YPF Bolivia. Navios owns and operates the largest bulk transfer and storage port terminal in Uruguay. It is located in the port of Nueva Palmira at the confluence of the Parana and Uruguay rivers