New giants on the horizon
OOCL is maintaining its contracts with shipyards Nantong Cosco KHI Ship Engineering (NACKS) and Dalian Cosco KHI Ship Engineering (DACKS) for five newbuilt container vessels. Each unit at a cost of USD 155.68 million will have a nominal capacity of 23,000 teu. The carrier expects to begin taking delivery of the vessels in 2023.
Today, OOCL's fleet comprises six G-Class mega-vessels, each with a capacity of approximately 21,000 teu. These vessels were ordered in March 2015, as the first step in OOCL’s expansion into this class of mega vessels for the Asia-Europe trade.
The original plan at that time was to have ordered a second batch of five to six mega vessels. However, this addition to the original order has not taken place so far, first because of the terrible market conditions of 2016, and then throughout 2017-2018 with the focus being on the execution of the sale of the OOIL group to Cosco Shipping. (mw)