Alibaba affiliate Transfar Shipping is planning to order five newbuild 8,000 teu vessels for its AliExpress transpacific service.
Getting Into Action
Transfar believes it can compete for Alibaba’s business by shortening the Asia-US voyage time to 10 days, compared with 15 to 25 with conventional liner operators. Transfar is said to be in discussions with Chinese shipyards to build the methanol-fuelled ships.
Freight rates have weakened, and there are ups and downs in this market. Transfar is in the shipping business for the long run and we want to establish a solo service that can bring e-commerce cargo to Alibaba customers in the shortest time possible.
Transfar now offers a peel-off, single-stack, quick pick-up service at Long Beach Terminal in the US – containers can easily be retrieved from the stack by segregating those destined for a particular owner.
Collaboration For The Future
Late last month, Transfar took delivery of the 1,800 teu A Goryu, having purchased the new building from Starocean Marine. The company now controls seven vessels, with a total capacity of 21,758 teu. The Transfar official added: “We need more capacity to support our growing network, particularly Alibaba’s international expansion. Our long-term planning has taken carbon neutrality and new energy into consideration to meet the global decarbonisation target in 2050.”
Meanwhile, Alibaba has pledged fast worldwide deliveries of 72 hours, and has beefed up its use of air freight to do so. On 13 October, the e-commerce giant announced a deepening of its collaboration with US cargo airline Atlas Air to speed up air freight between China and South America.
The collaboration will take off with a 747-8F, with capacity for 133 tonnes of cargo, departing Hong Kong, transiting Miami, with final destination at Bogotá, Colombia. Then the route will be upgraded to include a Hong Kong-Miami-São Paulo-Bogotá route, which will shorten flight duration to only 37 hours.
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Source: TheLoadstar
