OOCL joins big-ship league

OOCL joins big-ship league    Hong Kong-based liner carrier OOCL on Wednesday finalized an order for six 13,000-TEU vessels from South Korea's Samsung Heavy Industries.
   The vessels, due for delivery in 2013, would be, by far, the largest in OOCL's fleet of 79 ships (of which 46 are owned, and 33 are chartered).
   According to American Shipper affiliate ComPair Data, the largest vessels in OOCL's fleet are its 16 8,063-TEU vessels.
   The new vessels would likely be deployed on the Asia-Europe trade, the only trade with enough demand and port infrastructure to support such large ships.

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   Stephen Ng, OOCL’s director of corporate planning, said as much in a conference in Shenzhen last fall: “All the benefits of economy of scale are found in Asia/Europe. Why are big ships not coming to the transpacific? Without terminal productivity, we will hesitate to put large vessels into those ports.'
   According to maritime analyst Alphaliner, the company's order book now includes 14 ships, representing nearly 150,000 TEUs of capacity. That equates to roughly 42 percent of its current fleet. Only COSCO Container Lines, Hanjin Shipping and Zim have a higher proportion of ordered to existing capacity.
   OOCL's cash position is strong, having made $4.4 billion in profits from the sale of most of its container terminals and property development assets in the last four years. The company said at the time of the sales that it wanted to focus on its core business of liner shipping and logistics.
   The carrier also made $922 million in operating profit in 2010. Though some of that profit is offset by a $301 million loss in 2009, OOCL performed well relative to the rest of the industry in 2009, losing less and maintaining the lowest loss margin of the global 20 top carriers. ' Eric Johnson