The Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) is positioned to become the first container line with a fleet capacity of 5 million twenty-foot equivalent units (teu) later this month, analysts at Alphaliner said.
MSC overtook Maersk as the world’s largest container carrier 16 months ago and has been rapidly expanding its fleet through a combination of secondhand purchases and new vessel orders.
As of May, MSC’s fleet consisted of 753 ships with a total capacity of 4,956,720 teu.
With the imminent delivery of new buildings MSC Michel Cappelini and MSC Gemma from Yangzijiang and CSSC respectively, MSC is expected to surpass the 5 million teu mark before the end of May.
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To put the size and growth of MSC’s fleet into perspective, reaching 5 million teu would be roughly equivalent to the entire global container shipping fleet at the turn of the millennium.
With a substantial orderbook of 127 vessels, amounting to a combined capacity of 1.66 million teu, MSC is projected to reach the 6 million teu milestone within approximately a year.
However, the exact timing will depend on the acquisition and sale of vessels.
While the 2M Alliance with Maersk is set to expire in early 2025, MSC is viewed as having the necessary scale to operate independently outside of major alliances, as it has previously indicated.
Alphaliner suggests that due to MSC’s significant size, the carrier will be able to offer attractive port connections on all major trade routes without joining another alliance. Nonetheless, the report anticipates that MSC may maintain selected smaller-scale partnerships on specific trades.
