A year of transportation industry acquisitions: key players in Alaska under new ownership.

• Author: Lavrakas, Dimitra
• Position: TRANSPORTATION

Alaska's transportation industry is undergoing changes in ownership of some of its key players. It all started about a year ago when American Fast Freight (AFF) was acquired by The Resolute Fund II, L.P., an affiliate of The Jordan Company, a middle-market private equity firm managing more than $5 billion of committed capital across several industries. The company is headquartered in New York with offices in Chicago and Shanghai.

Though AFF is headquartered in Washington state, its business is extensive in Alaska and the company is operating out of a new 30,000 sq. ft., forty-nine door, open-beamed, warehouse with a high pile storage chill/freeze area with the receiving doors in the coolers, the only one of its kind in Alaska. The new facility, designed by Gary Peterson of GPARCH Architects and built by Watterson Construction, became AFF's Alaska operations base in November 2012.

"The AFF team has built a premium asset-light freight forwarding business differentiated by its scale, expertise, and long-standing customer relationships. By consistently providing its customers with the value-added services they demand, AFF has earned its reputation as a leader in its marketplace," said Brian Higgins, principal, The Jordan Company, at the time of the acquisition in January 2013. "We look forward to partnering with the AFF leadership team in continuing to build its business, both organically and through acquisition."

All in the Family

In May last year Carlile Transportation Systems, one of the largest trucking and logistics companies in Alaska, was bought by Seattle-based Saltchuk Resources.

"We have had consistent intentions in Alaska for over thirty years: find very high quality companies that share our culture and values; get to know their owners and build a trusting relationship that, when the time is right, could lead to a successful transaction; [and] reinvest heavily into the companies we own with a multigenerational time horizon," says Mark Tabbutt, chairman of Saltchuk Resources.

Both companies are family owned and are no strangers to each other, Tabbutt says.

"Our growth in Alaska has primarily been through acquiring family businesses," he says. "Delta Western, Inlet Petroleum, Northern Air Cargo, and Carlile were all family owned when we purchased them. We find that the cultures of family owned businesses are closely aligned with our own. Our goal is to keep Harry and John [McDonald] engaged as long as they want to. There is a huge...