Supreme Owner Made a Billionaire Feeding U.S. War Machine
6 October 2013, by David de Jong (Bloomberg)
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/print/2013-10-06/supreme-owner-made-a-billionaire-feeding-u-s-war-machine.html

Excerpt:

Chemical warfare and car bombings are just a few of the hazards working in war-torn countries such as Iraq and Syria. For Supreme Group BV, it’s the cost of doing business.

Dubai-based Supreme delivers fuel and food -- 100,000 meals a day -- to troops stationed in some of the most inhospitable parts of the world, including Liberia, Mali and Sudan.

The perilous business, where contractors dodge bullets fired by the Taliban and explosives set by insurgents, has made the company’s majority owner, Stephen Orenstein, a billionaire.

“Our mantra is to provide the same quality of service in Rwanda or Somalia as we do for restaurant chains in Germany,” Orenstein, 49, said in a phone interview from his office in Dubai.

“We took a developed world standard and brought it to the developing world.”

Orenstein’s biggest business has been supplying military personnel in Afghanistan. Since the start of the war there in 2001, Supreme’s revenue has increased more than 50-fold to $5.5 billion in 2011.

According to Supreme’s chief financial officer, Mike Thorne, more than 90% of the company’s revenue is derived from its Afghanistan operations.

That’s about to change. With the withdrawal of NATO and American troops and the impending loss of a $10 billion food contract with the U.S. military, the company is projecting it will lose more than 75% of its sales by the end of 2014.

“We’re still a financially sound company, so I don’t view it as a collapse,” Thorne said by phone. “But we’re going to be a much smaller company.”

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