In Thailand during the 2011 monsoon season, flooding reached levels not seen in decades. Over the course of several heavy rain months, businesses suffered $45 billion in damages. Particularly hard hit were the high tech manufacturers in southern provinces.

Morgan’s Thai operations team kept our clients a step ahead of conditions: “We started plotting the flood paths in Bangkok and down the Chao Phraya river from the very beginning of the crisis,” says Steven Ng, Morgan’s Asia Pacific managing director.

“Our largest operations are in the port city of Laem Chabang, at the mouth of the Gulf of Thailand. But we also needed to ensure that trucking routes remained viable to Bangkok’s airport and to other Southeast Asia ground destinations.”

Morgan issued regular guidance to affected customers. Don Overly, Morgan’s U.S.-based VP, Accounts, recalls that “this was our key differentiator. We were monitoring the situation daily. You can’t do that just by watching CNN. You have to be there.”

After nearly six months of careful management, no Morgan clients suffered delays or damages. It was a remarkable outcome to a crisis that affected sixty-five of Thailand’s seventy-seven provinces and washed much of the capital underwater at times.

“We had a plan to keep our customers and their supply chains safe,” says Ng. Where other providers broker services to third parties, Morgan puts its own equipment, technology and people in key locations from Asia to the Americas.
That’s the power of local knowledge.