In the overall score ranking of liner companies in 2024, Maersk ranked first
As the global shipping market becomes more competitive, and after experiencing widespread liner delays during the pandemic, the reliability of liner companies has become the focus of attention. Sea-Intelligence has released a reliability ranking of the world's top 13 shipping lines, and Maersk is the most reliable liner in the world.
"Since 2019, even the most reliable of the world's top 13 shipping companies have not maintained their most reliable position on at least 30 percent of the routes they serve each month," Sea-Intelligence said.
After benchmarking the reliability of schedules on 34 trade routes around the world, Sea-Intelligence found that while individual companies may perform well on some routes, the true top players maintain high reliability rankings on most routes. These companies may not always be number one, but they are consistently in the top five. They are often second or third, if not first, and rarely fall out of the top five. This consistency puts them ahead of other companies in terms of overall performance.
To further quantify liner performance between January and September 2024, Sea-Intelligence calculated the percentage ranking of each liner on each route, with a score of 1.0 for the first place, 0.9 for the second place, and so on until the tenth place scored 0.1. These scores are added up to give each company a combined global performance score.
In the overall score ranking, Maersk took the top spot. On the routes examined, Maersk ranked first 16% of the time and remained within the top three 44% of the time. It was followed by Star Line (ZIM), which ranked first on 17% of routes and in the top three on 39% of routes. In addition, CMA CGM, Mediterranean Shipping (MSC) and PIL also performed well in the top five.
In contrast, ONE had the lowest overall score. ONE ranked first on only 2% of its routes and was in the top three only 30% of the time. This reflects ONE's relatively erratic performance in route reliability and lack of consistency advantage across multiple routes.
To sum up, Maersk, with its consistency and high frequency reliability ranking, is the best performing liner company in 2024. However, Star Line, CMA CGM, Mediterranean Shipping and PIL are also showing strong competitiveness. For shippers and logistics companies looking to improve the reliability of their schedules, choosing these companies will help reduce the risk of delays and improve the stability of the supply chain. In the future shipping market, liner companies need not only to pursue short-term leading performance, but also to maintain long-term consistency to win the trust and favor of customers
Gemenon has a 90% on-time rate
Previously, Sindh Maritime Network reported that Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd formed the Gemini alliance to form a "central radiation network", focusing on the direction of 90% on-time rate.
According to the "Gemini" cooperation plan, Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd will officially start cooperation on shipping services on the east-west trade corridor in February 2025. Gemenon will implement a "hub and spoke" structure, a network that will limit the number of direct ports of call for the main route to a minimum.
Specifically, the Gemini Alliance will enable transshipment mode. Reducing the number of key ports of call from major routes and instead transshipping to smaller feeder vessels, with the ultimate aim of increasing the sea service network to 90 per cent punctuality.
According to Maersk, "The new Marine service network will consist of 27 or 29 efficiently operated trunk lines and 30 flexible shuttle express lines. Together, the two companies will put 300 or 340 vessels into operation."
But Caroline Becquart, the "current" MSC's senior vice president and head of MSC's Asia network, does not seem to agree with Maersk's on-time rate: "As it stands, I don't think it's fair to say that we have an on-time rate of 90%. "I don't know what [Gemini] is basing that number on, but we can't get to 90 percent today."
According to eeSea, "Planned reliability and especially on-time performance have always been part of container transport. Not just because goods are supposed to arrive on time, but because the industry has long argued that well-functioning networks are more efficient and therefore less costly. But Gemini said the promised 90 percent on-time performance rate does not define how it will be achieved and is open to debate.
Moreover, from the reliability of Sea-Intelligence released this time, there is still a long way to go for the Gemini Alliance to reach 90% on-time rate, but there is no unified on-time rate standard at present, and the data of Sea-Intelligence also has certain defects. At the same time, general strikes and delays have made it difficult to achieve punctuality and reliability.
According to the eeSea, "Since the start of the epidemic, the global average delay has fallen from 0.77 days (18.5 hours) in June 2020 to 4.63 days in September 2024." In February 2022, the delay reached a high level of 7.47 days.
Therefore, whether the future binary star on-time rate can reach 90% still needs time to test.
