Container Shipping Lines

Container Shipping Lines

Currently there are hundreds of container shipping lines around the world.

They vary from giant corporations (such as Maersk, CMA-CGM, Hapag-Lloyd, China Shipping Container Lines...) with hundreds of container vessels, to medium regional lines operating dozen of vessels (e.g. RCL, TS Lines), to even much smaller companies operating just few or even one box ship (usually domestic shipping lines in countries).

Those companies provide different wide range of services, yet, they all serve a common mission: transporting cargo containers around the world. 

According to AXS-Alphaliner, a worldwide reference in liner shipping, 100 leading container shipping lines are operating (either owning or chartering in) approximately 4,400 vessels, with capacity of about 12.5 million TEUs, which accounts for up to 96,1% the capacity of the whole world’s cellular fleet. The world containership fleet in January 2010 has over 4,700 vessels with total capacity of about 13 million TEUs.

The detail rankings and capability of 100 top container shipping lines are summarized in the following table.

 

AXS Alphaliner - Top 100 operated fleets
Rnk	Operators	Total		Rnk	Operators	Total
		TEU	Ships			TEU	Ships
1	APM-Maersk	2,052,270	540	51	MACS	16,225	13
2	MSC	1,498,296	390	52	Meratus	16,175	39
3	CMA CGM Group	1,034,255	356	53	Dole Ocean Liner	15,668	29
4	Evergreen Line	557,444	150	54	Heung-A Shipping	14,811	19
5	APL	543,609	137	55	Westwood	13,828	7
6	Hapag-Lloyd	463,457	112	56	Nam Sung	13,273	21
7	COSCO Container Lines	453,876	135	57	Simatech	13,261	10
8	CSCL	450,337	124	58	Delphis NV / Team Lines	12,711	14
9	Hanjin Shipping	434,852	98	59	United Feeder Services	12,597	15
10	NYK	409,137	107	60	Tanto Intim Line	12,424	31
11	CSAV Group	343,776	98	61	FESCO	12,372	17
12	K Line	342,299	90	62	Containerships OY	12,317	14
13	OOCL	340,439	73	63	OEL / Shreyas	12,135	12
14	MOL	339,673	90	64	Borchard Lines	11,303	14
15	Yang Ming Line	312,962	77	65	Log-In Logistica	10,306	8
16	Hamburg Süd Group	309,570	103	66	HubLine Bhd	9,567	18
17	Zim	305,538	94	67	Vinalines	9,530	15
18	Hyundai M.M.	274,529	53	68	Marfret	9,438	9
19	UASC	196,237	49	69	Mariana Express Lines	9,421	10
20	PIL	193,965	110	70	Boluda Lines	9,090	11
21	MISC Berhad	125,101	39	71	Valfajre Eight Shg Co	8,803	12
22	Wan Hai Lines	125,060	66	72	Irish Continental Group	8,389	13
23	HDS Lines	96,325	31	73	Samskip	8,366	12
24	RCL	53,435	39	74	NSCSA	8,100	4
25	Sea Consortium	53,205	46	75	Universal Africa Line	8,056	16
26	Grimaldi (Napoli)	50,988	46	76	Tarros	7,932	8
27	TS Lines	48,925	27	77	Great White Fleet	7,914	18
28	KMTC	37,349	32	78	Bien Dong Shg (Vinashin)	7,820	15
29	CCNI	36,712	16	79	SeaFreight	7,629	8
30	STX Pan Ocean	34,706	26	80	Shanghai Jin Jiang	7,459	9
31	SITC	34,424	39	81	Tropical Shg	7,183	16
32	Horizon Lines	34,150	16	82	OPDR	6,522	10
33	Arkas Line / EMES	30,887	27	83	Eimskip	6,476	10
34	UniFeeder	30,814	38	84	DAL	6,353	2
35	Maruba + CLAN	30,146	13	85	Kambara Kisen	6,167	8
36	Matson	29,074	15	86	Conti Lines	6,165	6
37	Emirates Shipping Line	27,592	10	87	Caribbean Feeder Services	6,038	9
38	Seaboard Marine	27,477	33	88	Independent Container Line	5,910	4
39	S.C. India	27,468	10	89	Yanghai Shipping Co (YSC)	5,345	5
40	Schöller Group	27,436	18	90	Chun Kyung (CK Line)	5,302	11
41	Samudera	27,062	31	91	Johan Shg	5,263	12
42	Swire Shipping	26,635	25	92	Formosa Plastics	5,251	5
43	Sinotrans	24,139	28	93	Melfi C.L.	5,194	5
44	Nile Dutch Shg	24,042	17	94	Peel Ports (BG Freight)	5,181	9
45	Linea Messina	23,156	17	95	Qatar National Line	5,156	8
46	Sinokor	22,930	24	96	Dannebrog / Nordana	4,953	7
47	Turkon Line	20,635	16	97	Shanghai Hai Hua (Hasco)	4,766	7
48	Crowley Liner Services	19,624	23	98	IMTC	4,580	9
49	Grand China Logistics	18,916	15	99	UAFL	4,557	5
50	Temas Line	18,914	35	100	Marguisa	4,408	5

From different perspective, those container shipping lines are sorted by country where head offices are located. That way shows 10 nations with largest fleet of container ships.

Ranking	Nations	TEU	Ships
1	Denmark	2,088,037	585
2	Switzerland	1,498,296	390
3	Japan	1,097,276	295
4	Taiwan, China	1,044,391	320
5	France	1,043,693	365
6	China	993,917	357
7	S.Korea	843,097	289
8	Germany	829,563	258
9	Singapore	800,200	303
10	Chile	380,488	114

Top nations (territories) with the largest box fleet

Shipping lines in Vietnam

Among top 100 leading container lines, Vietnam only have two representatives with modest position: Vinalines (ranking 67) and Bien Dong (ranking 78).

In Vietnam, container liner service only began from late of the 1980s. At the beginning of 2010, Vietnam has 12 container shipping lines which own and operate over 30 liners of total 20,600 TEUs. Some operators participated in the liner market from last decade, such as Gemadept, Vinalines, Vinafco… while some other players are pretty new in the market; VSICO, VOSCO are examples. Some other lines have only one ships, either owning (like Viconship) or chartering (Viet Sun). Names of these companies are listed below.

• Biển Đông
• Đông Đô
• Gemadept
• Nam Triệu
• Vinafco
• Vinalines
• Vinashin Lines
• Viet Sun
• VOSCO
• VSICO

In general, most Vietnamese container shipping lines provide domestic service on Haiphong-Hochiminh and backward route. Several lines with more experience (Gemadept, Vinalines, Bien Dong) provide feeder services to regional hub-ports like Hong Kong, Singapore. Viconship is deploying a 380-TEU feeder ship on Hai Phong-Hong Kong. DHP (a joint venture between Dong Do and Hai Phong port) some time send their vessels to the same route, yet whenever possible, they alter plan and offer to chartering out their ships.

With restricted service network, Vietnamese container shipping lines only take care of small percentage of trade volume to and from the nation. Main players in the attractive market are still foreign main shipping lines.

In 2010, more than 40 foreign shipping lines are present in Vietnam, and taking an important role in import-export shipping market. They maintain activities through a local agent, a joint-venture, or in a few cases, a company with 100% foreign ownership.

Detail about Top 100 container shipping lines around the world and theircontainer tracking pages

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