Business | Shipping
UASC awards Dh5.5b contract to Samsung for nine container ships
Korean company says Mideast represents about 20% of its total order book valued at $46b.
- By Saifur Rahman, Business Editor
- Published: 23:41 June 29, 2008
Dubai: United Arab Shipping Company (UASC), the largest operator of ocean-going vessels in the Gulf, on Sunday awarded a Dh5.5 billion contract to Samsung Heavy Industries to build and supply nine A13 type container ships each with a capacity of 13,100 twenty-feet-equivalent units (TEUs).
Deliveries of these are scheduled between late 2010 to end of 2011, officials said at a signing ceremony held in Dubai yesterday.
This constitutes the biggest container ship newbuilding order ever placed by a GCC-owned company, officials said, as demand for additional capacities rise.
UASC, which is owned by UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Iraq, currently operates a fleet of 41 fully cellular container vessels with three more being delivered this year and 10 more in 2009.
Strong growth
By the time the nine A13 ships join the fleet, its strength will go up to 60.
Shaikh Ali Al Thani, UASC board chairman said, the vessels will be deployed on the Far East-Middle East-Europe route, where the industry is witnessing a strong growth.
Ken Bloch Sorensen, UASC president and chief executive, said, the fleet growth is in line with the industry's growth.
"With the new orders we will be more than able to meet the growing needs of the industry," he said.
Officials of Samsung, the world's second biggest shipbuilder, said, the Middle East represents about 20 per cent of its total order book, valued currently at $46 billion.
"We currently have an order backlog of 500 vessels, of which about 44 have been placed by our Middle Eastern customers," Jing Wan Kim, Samsung's president and chief executive, told Gulf News.
"This year, we will deliver 56 ships with a possible turnover exceeding $10 billion, up from last year's $9 billion."
He said, Samsung will overtake Huyndai - currently the world's biggest shipbuilder - by 2010, in turnover.
More than 80 per cent of the world's freight moves on sea. More than 4,300 container ships are currently in service.
Soaring oil prices have negatively impacted the marine transportation as sea freights have been steadily rising since last year, almost in line with high oil price.
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