Groupe DSO was a collection of small business units that operated from 1967 to 1997 in the Asia-Pacific region. The core focus of these business units was logistic integration and consultancy.

History

The company was founded in 1967 by R. Milhous Hoboct, a Czech-English engineer and entrepreneur. It found some significant successes in its BSDN and Checkpoint logistics systems; however due to a number of regulatory obstacles and failed business endeavours, a decision was made to dissolve the company in November 1997.

Business Alliances

Groupe DSO was a member of the FALO alliance, a close-knit set of companies providing reciprocal services. The FALO alliance comprised: * Groupe DSO: logistics and engineering integration * BSDN (a spin-off of the DSO BSDN business unit) * Pacific-East: legal services * SBU: financial services

Business Units

The organisational structure of Groupe DSO was of a number of small business units, each with a clearly defined purpose and goal. Central financial and administrative management was controlled by a holding company named DSO Centraal.

DSO BSDN

The ''Bow-Scott Distribution Network'', named after its creators, Ashleigh Bow and Dr. Shalain Scott, provided an integrated 'end-to-end' solution to the distribution of large volumes of data by traditional courier means. The BSDN business unit was an

incubator An incubator is anything that performs or facilitates various forms of incubation, and may refer to: Biology and medicine * Incubator (culture), a device used to grow and maintain microbiological cultures or cell cultures * Incubator (egg), a de ...

initiative whose aim was to provide start-up capital for DSO's core businesses: logistic and engineering consultancy. After wild success and rapid expansion, it was later spun off as a separate entity in 1979. The now-independent BSDN faced trouble in the 1990s, when company-wide computer networks and the

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

rendered its business model obsolete.

DSO Checkpoint ''('Checkpoint Charlie')''

After the spinoff of the BSDN business unit, Groupe DSO sought to apply its logistic expertise to niche markets. It found most success in academia, where the DSO Checkpoint system was used by many libraries for transporting books and other media between branches. Workers often referred to the system as ''Checkpoint Charlie'' due to the strict, well-documented procedures that ensured its efficiency and reliability.

DSO CBS

The DSO CBS (Consultancy and Business Support) division provided business consultancy on leveraging technology to improve workplace logistics and operations. A large number of Indonesian clients allowed for a local subsidiary to be established, ''P.T. DSO Logisti''.

DSO EPI

The DSO EPI (Electro-Pyro Initiative) was a small, relatively short-lived business unit that was created in response to a government tender for safe physics teaching aids. (Himself an engineer, R. M. Hoboct was passionate about science education through practical and applied learning.) Although the tender was not successful, this unit enjoyed moderate success with its ''240'' series of electricity teaching apparatus; and ''Big Joe'', a safety chamber that allowed otherwise dangerous laboratory experiments to be conducted at greatly reduced risk. One commercial spinoff of the "Big Joe" project was the development of a highly puncture-proof design for food cans. In practice, however, these were little improvement over existing tin cans.

DSO Trabaction

DSO Trabaction was a division proposed and set up by Derek Helmutiffe; a DSO employee living in Germany, and keen Trabant enthusiast. This division helped facilitate and organise the supply of Trabant parts to enthusiasts across Western Germany, after the fall of the

Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall (german: Berliner Mauer, ) was a guarded concrete barrier that encircled West Berlin from 1961 to 1989, separating it from East Berlin and East Germany (GDR). Construction of the Berlin Wall was commenced by the government ...

and

German Reunification German reunification (german: link=no, Deutsche Wiedervereinigung) was the process of re-establishing Germany as a united and fully sovereign state, which took place between 2 May 1989 and 15 March 1991. The day of 3 October 1990 when the Ge ...

. After Helmutiffe's migration to Australia in 1995, the division closed.

Trivia

Groupe DSO was a minor sponsor of

Ukyo Katayama is a Japanese former racing driver and team manager, most notable for competing for six years in Formula One. He participated in 97 Grands Prix, debuting on 1 March 1992. He scored a total of five championship points, all of them for the Tyrrel ...

's Tyrrell

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car in .

References

* van Dort, J., "DSO Begins Indonesian Connection". ''The Age''. 11 February 1985. * "Trabaction: Trabi-Werke aus Australien?". ''Trabi-Magazin''. August 1992. * Savage, I. J., "Groupe DSO Fades Away". ''Herald Sun''. 12 November 1997. {{DEFAULTSORT:DSO, Groupe Logistics companies of Australia Business incubators of Australia Business services companies established in 1967 Companies disestablished in 1997 1967 establishments in Australia Business incubators of Germany