The container shipping companies Hapag-Lloyd and Maersk have agreed to cooperate. The alliance is scheduled to launch in February next year to enable customers to receive more punctual deliveries.
Germany’s largest container shipping company Hapag-Lloyd and the Danish shipping company Maersk want to join forces in freight transport. In order to enable customers to receive more punctual deliveries and to overcome the challenges of the climate-neutral conversion, they have agreed on a cooperation, as the companies jointly announced today. The alliance is scheduled to start in February 2025 and is called the “Gemini Cooperation”.
Both partners will give up their previous alliances with other shipping companies at the beginning of next year. Next January, Hapag-Lloyd will leave the previous alliance “THE Alliance” with the shipping companies ONE from Japan, Yang Ming from Taiwan and HMM from South Korea. Maersk and the world’s largest shipping company MSC had already announced at the beginning of 2023 that they would dissolve their alliance, called “2M”, in January 2025.
Not all fleets are going up
According to the industry service “Alphaliner”, the Danish Maersk is the world’s number two container shipping company with a fleet of more than 670 ships. The Hamburg shipping company Hapag-Lloyd is in fifth place with almost 270 ships.
However, not all of the two partners’ fleets will be included in the alliance: the new cooperation will include a pool of around 290 ships with a combined capacity of 3.4 million standard containers (TEU), as stated in the statement. Maersk will contribute 60 percent of the capacity, Hapag-Lloyd the remaining 40 percent.
Faster Climate neutrality?
“As part of the agreement, the two companies have set the ambitious goal of achieving schedule reliability of over 90 percent once the network is fully deployed,” it said. Hapag-Lloyd boss Rolf Habben Jansen expects the quality of the offer to be better.
“In addition, we will benefit from improvements in efficiency in our operations and joint efforts to further accelerate the decarbonization of our industry,” said Habben Jansen. Maersk wants to achieve “net zero” greenhouse gas emissions by 2040, Hapag-Lloyd by 2045.
Stronger market power of shipping companies is feared
Shipping alliances are not without controversy in the maritime economy. For example, land-based transshipment companies fear that shipping companies will have greater market power. That’s why they lobbied the EU Commission to end the so-called block exemption rule.
This gave shipping companies reduced competition rules when cooperating. The corresponding regulation expires on April 25th. “However, this does not mean that cooperation between shipping companies would then be illegal under EU antitrust law,” says the Brussels authority.
Containers could become scarce
While the two major European shipping companies decide to cooperate with the aim of improving punctuality, international shipping could come under even greater pressure as a result of the Houthis’ attacks on merchant ships in the Red Sea.
According to DHL boss Tobias Meyer, the attacks could lead to a shortage of containers in Asia. This could happen in the coming weeks, as the containers may not be transported back to Asia on a sufficient scale, said Meyer at the World Economic Forum in Davos. However, the current situation cannot be compared with the supply chain difficulties three to four years ago.
The Red Sea is one of the world’s most important shipping routes, connecting Asia and Europe. Because of the Houthis’ repeated attacks on cargo ships, many shipping companies are avoiding the Red Sea and the Suez Canal, through which about 15 percent of world trade passes. Instead, the freighters take the route around the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa.