Hyundai Merchant US Volumes UP
South Korea's leading container carrier Hyundai Merchant Marine (HMM) will allocate more vessels to meet rising demand on U.S. routes in the coming months, reported Yonhap.
HMM expects a shortage of container carriers on the high-traffic routes from August to October as U.S. customers want more products from China and Southeast Asia, MANA correspondent reported.
Hyundai Merchant, which currently operates 110 vessels, will consult with its alliance partners such as Maersk Line of Denmark and Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) of Switzerland to decide on whether to increase the number of container ships, the report quoted a unnamed company spokesman.
Meanwhile, a separate report said that has announced that its Asia-US West Coast (USWC) volume in June 2017 increased by 77 per cent year-on-year.
According to PIERS Data, HMM’s Asia-USWC cargo handling rose, year-on-year, from 7,953 TEU/WK to 14,055 TEU/WK at the end of June 2017. Moreover, the line ranked 4th in terms of market share, up from 12th the previous year.
HMM’s Asia all-US route cargo handling also rose year-on-year from 11,626 TEU/WK to 17,291 TEU/WK (49 per cent) in June 2017.
Furthermore, HMM’s USWC market share has grown to 7.4 per cent, up 3.4 per cent from the same month last year. Its all-US route market share has also grown to 5.8 per cent, up 2 per cent year-on-year.
Hyundai Merchant generates 80 percent of its sales from the container ship business, with the remaining 20 percent coming from bulk ship operations.