Several challenges for ‘World’s Largest Container Ship’

The glamourous title of the ‘World’s Largest Container Ship’ looks set to see several challenges during the next few months, as multiple new builds come into service.

Officially, the record is currently held by Evergreen, with the ‘Ever Ace’ capable of carrying 23,992 TEU (Twenty Foot Equivalent Units). However, OOCL have taken recent delivery of the ‘OOCL Spain’, which has not quite come into service yet, and the vessel is understood to be capable of carrying 24,188 TEU.

The OOCL welcoming announcement only stated that the vessel is ‘amongst the very largest container ships in the world’. That could be because MSC has a new entry that has already started sea trials and is expected to join their fleet next month – The ‘MSC Irina’ can carry 24,346 TEU.

Even with the accolade of the largest container ship about to change hands twice quickly, this may not be the end of the upcoming challenges. There are numerous new mega ships joining the three carrier alliances in the next few months, with MSC due to welcome four on their own.

However, the timing is far from perfect for carriers to be taking on new capacity, as demand is very low on East to West trades. Ships like these take 2-3 years to build and demand was undoubtedly much higher when the orders were made.

Three Ocean Networks due to become Four

2M Alliance members, Maersk & MSC, recently confirmed that they be will ending their vessel sharing arrangements in 2025 and are set to proceed as standalone carriers.

Since the original announcement last month, the intentions of the world’s biggest two carriers, that have been collaborating since 2015, have become clearer.

Originally, it looked like we would be seeing a shake up of the global alliances in the coming months, with the assumption that they may be seeking alternative partnerships.

However, it now appears that both organisations are planning to go forward as standalone carriers, operating their own networks. This suggests we will be moving to four global ocean networks instead of three, with no immediate changes expected for ‘The Alliance’ or the ‘Ocean Alliance’.

Maersk Line’s CEO pretty much confirmed the above recently, when stating “Today there are three major networks, in the future there will be four.”

While the carriers are officially due to split in 2025, it is believed that they will be working towards their own goals from now, meaning we could see changes on some routes from next year, or maybe even later this year.

The set up of three global alliances has been in place since the aftermath of Hanjin going bust, which caused the market a great deal of pain back in 2016/7.

Simarco’s ocean freight team are following these developments with great interest.

Simarco launch Norway Export service

Simarco’s European road freight team are delighted to confirm that our new export groupage service to Norway has now launched, the first of our new Scandinavian services being introduced during the next few weeks.

The twice-weekly direct trailer service now departs from our Witham and Stoke depots and provides door delivery solutions for groupage and part loads, including dangerous goods, to all major towns and cities throughout Norway.

Thanks to our strategic partnership arrangements in Norway, we are also able to offer customs warehousing and fulfilment solutions upon arrival at destination, which couple seamlessly with our fulfilment capabilities throughout the UK.

Our sales team are able to offer some very competitive rates, and would be delighted to hear from you should you require further information. Therefore, please do not hesitate to contact us using the details below.

Simarco Supporting Middle East Rally

Simarco have actively provided a number of logistics services ahead of this week’s FIA Middle East Rally Championship event in Qatar.

The second round of the championship is being held in Doha between 16th and 18th February, and our air freight team have been busy in the build up.

Our primary objective was to get the Ford Fiesta rally car to arrive ahead of the event for one of the leading competitors. Thanks to great planning and execution, the car arrived in Doha with time to spare on the 7th February.

As part of the motor sport package we provided, we also moved the Pirelli tyres into Qatar from France and spare parts from the Netherlands ahead of this week’s competition.

Officials at the Qatar Motor and Motorcycle Federation (QMMF) have laid on a revised three-day format for this year’s event, offering 13 timed special stages in a route of over 600 km.

Fingers crossed it will be a successful three days for the car and driver.

Potential for delays due to Civil Service strike

Next week’s civil service strike, on Wednesday February 1st, is widely expected to impact customs at the UK’s airports, container ports and ro-ro ports.

Although HMRC employees are not directly involved in the walk out, around 100,000 civil service staff are set to strike, and the industrial action includes Home Office employees, notably Border Force.

According to HMRC, the movement of goods through UK ports and airports could be impacted from Wednesday through to Thursday morning, this includes UK Border controls in Calais, Dunkirk and Coquelles.

Simarco may look at altering some consolidation service schedules during this period and will manage the situation as it unfolds. If you have concerns about urgent shipments, then please do not hesitate to contact us.

Far East Exports go from Strength to Strength.

Since we started our drive to build our own ocean freight consolidations to the Far East last year, Simarco’s capability to provide solutions for door to door movements to the region has gone from strength to strength.

By committing to and developing our own consolidations, we have been able to provide better operational control, less physical handling of products, better delivery times and more economical pricing, while opening up a range of destinations throughout Asia and Oceania.

Our consolidation services now load from our Midlands and Southern depots every week destined for the following countries:

For further information on our services, or to get a competitive quote, please contact Luis Pinto in our export team – email luis.pinto@simarco.com.

Simarco set Emissions Target in line with SBTi

We are pleased to announce that Simarco has set near-term company-wide emissions reductions targets in line with the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi).

SBTi is a global body enabling businesses to set ambitious emissions reductions targets in line with the latest climate science. This initiative is a collaboration between CDP, the United Nations Global Compact, World Resources Institute (WRI) and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).

It is focused on accelerating companies across the world to halve emissions before 2030 and achieve net-zero emissions before 2050.

Simarco remain committed to our five-year road map to roll out our sustainability vision and goals.

French strike may impact Logistics this week

A powerful cross-sector strike is due to take place throughout France on Thursday 19th January, which aims to scupper President Macron’s pensions reforms and is likely to cause major disruption later this week.

The country’s unions have united for the first time in years to oppose the government’s plans to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64, and effectively create a national strike.

Unions are counting on French people, who seem to be overwhelmingly against Macron’s reform, to mobilise and join street protests throughout the nation. The social movement is due to be launched in the heart of cities and at certain strategic places, such as ports, airports and industrial locations.

Naturally, we may see some disruption to road and air freight services travelling to, from or via France later this week. Where possible, Simarco will look to use the most viable routes during this period and will manage the situation as it unfolds.

If you have concerns about urgent shipments, then please do not hesitate to contact us.

Team Simarco “Walk to China” Challenge

Simarco staff have taken up the ‘Walk to China’ challenge this week, which does not mean that team members will be relinquishing their work duties and arriving in Beijing this July.

The challenge is to collectively walk 4,846 miles, the equivalent of walking from the UK to China.

The Simarco Connections group is running a competition to promote a healthy start to 2023 by inviting all staff to get out walking and recording their steps. 

The challenge started on 9th January and will continue until 28^th February 2023.  All miles will be recorded and the winner, announced on 1^st March, will receive a Garmin VivoFit Watch. 

Simarco felt this would be a great initiative for staff wellbeing and we are all following the team’s progress with great interest.  If the team remain on track, they would be expected to have crossed the border into Germany by the end of the first week

Northern Ireland – Simarco Lead The Way

Northern Ireland transport, to and from the UK, has been a hot political topic since Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal was first announced.

However, Simarco continue to lead the way and make the export process as simple as possible by completing the necessary TSS (Trader Support Service) for customers, who are required to have both a GB and XI EORI Number.

Simarco provide an established daily groupage and FTL (full trailer load) service to Belfast, serving the six counties of Northern Ireland with either 48 hour deliveries or express next day deliveries.

We also provide a daily import service for groupage and FTL with an express next day services also available.

The main features of our services include:

• Daily Northern Ireland export service
• Express Next day delivery
• 48 Hour delivery
• Accompanied trailers
• TSS completed by Simarco
• Full supplementary declaration on request
• Daily Import service – Next day available

For further information contact Lee Hodson by emailing lee.hodson@simarco.com.