Containership newbuilding orders aimed at delivery during the last two years of the decade have flooded in during recent days, and in one particular case, have thrown up questions on the future structure of the shipping alliances and whether what is being seen now is just the beginning of major changes within the container shipping industry.

During the first week of September, China COSCO Holdings announced that it had placed newbuilding orders with four shipyards in China for a total of 11 x 19,000/20,000 TEU vessels for delivery in 2018. The newbuilding order carried a total price tag of US$1.5 billion, and effectively was one of the largest ever placed by a container shipping line in terms of both capacity and cost.

As part of the CKYHE Alliance, COSCO’s new order is aimed at eventual deployment on the Asia/Europe trade on delivery in 2018.

First, under the DACKS Shipbuilding agreement (Dalian COSCO and KHI Ship Engineering Co), two of the vessels have been ordered at an aggregate cost of US$270.6 million, followed by a further order under the NACKS Shipbuilding agreement (Nantong COSCO and KHI Ship Engineering Co) at a cost of US$541.2 million.

Next up, under the CSSC Shipbuilding agreement, a further three have been ordered to be built by Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding at an aggregate cost of US$418.5 million, and finally, under the CSIC Shipbuilding agreements, a further two have been ordered from Dalian Shipbuilding at a cost of US$279 million.

Remaining in the CKYHE Alliance structure, Yangming has revealed that it has ordered 5 x 14,000 TEU vessels from Imabari Shipbuilding for delivery in 2018/2019. These five are in addition to the 15 x 14,000 TEU vessels ordered by Yangming two years ago with Seaspan, which are presently passing through the delivery stage.

But with the latest spate of CKYHE newbuilding orders, there is one important factor that has emerged: COSCO is the only one of the five lines that either has 20,000 TEU vessels in its fleet, or a newbuilding orderbook containing such capacity. The largest vessels ordered to date so far are 14,000 TEU.

Some industry experts believe the new COSCO orders are just the beginning of a further round of 20,000 TEU capacity new orders, and that there are more to follow for the alliance “very shortly.”

Other, more sceptical, industry analysts see this as being the beginning of a possible breakup of the present alliance structures, with COSCO pulling out of the CKYHE grouping, and possibly joining up with China Shipping Container Lines (CSCL).

Such suggestions of a possible COSCO/CSCL tie up have been strengthened recently by confirmation from the lines that they were due to make a special announcement related to the suspension of share price trading.

Further down the capacity scale in the recent spate of newbuilding orders, Evergreen has placed orders for 10 more 2,800 TEU vessels of the “E” class, this time from Imabari Shipbuilding. The vessels are in addition to the 10 2,800 TEU vessels orders by Evergreen from CSBC placed at the end of August.

Delivery of the second batch of 10 is expected to commence in the first half of 2018, with completion of the last of 10 scheduled during the first half of 2019. All 20 vessels are destined for deployment on the intra-Asia trades.

By Paul Richardson

Sea Freight Correspondent | London