Episodes of exclusive TPM content featuring interviews of key stakeholders and attendees.
WATCH NOW
The must-attend conference for the trans-Pacific and global container shipping and logistics community
LEARN ABOUT TPM
With global schedule reliability overall barely better than 50% (51.5% as of late November, down from over 64% a year earlier), liner services hyper-focused on schedule reliability and space guarantees have an obvious attraction for BCOs that demand service consistency but wish to avoid much more expensive airfreight. Matson has long operated a China-to-West Coast express service based on this premise and CMA CGM and Zim also operate expedited services to the West Coast. Another such service that has established itself in connecting Vietnam with the US Pacific Northwest is Sun Chief, a unique joint venture between UWL (a unit of World Group LLC) and Singapore-based Swire Shipping, where Swire provides the capacity and UWL commercializes the service focused overwhelmingly on direct BCO customers. Over the past 12 months, the fortnightly service delivered 92% schedule reliability to Seattle versus a 39% industry average on that route, according to Sea-Intelligence, with no blank sailings. It has obvious appeal to shippers with lean inventory models, which requires consistent schedule reliability, offering both the ocean leg and point-to- point service. With schedule reliability a growing shipper concern headed into 2025, Sun Chief offers an alternative view of supply chain value able to be created in ocean container transport.
Perhaps no other global shipping analyst has as broad and progressive a lens as Lars Jensen. Since 2018, the former Maersk executive, shipping entrepreneur, author, and, most recently, Vespucci Maritime founder has closed out TPM with his short-, medium- and long-term vision of what is next for the global containerized shipping market, whether it be the next wave of technology, aggressive zero-emission shipping targets, or provider-shipper relationships. Returning again this year to his closing TPM slot, Lars will offer his perspective of what the latest cycle of disruption means for the future of container shipping.