Taiwan’s Wan Hai Lines is awarding $804m-worth of containership contracts to two Asian shipyards.
Industry sources said the carrier is in the process of finalising an order with Japan Marine United (JMU) to construct a series of 2,800-teu boxships, as well as an order at China's Huangpu Wenchong Shipbuilding for 1,800-teu Bangkokmax feederships.
JMU is getting the bigger slice of the contract, valued at around $480m. The deal involves eight firm vessels plus four options. The Japanese shipbuilder was previously rumoured to have landed six to eight 1,900-teu Bangkokmax orders, but shipbuilding sources said this week that it will not be building those vessels.
State-owned Wenchong will be constructing a dozen ships, and sources said they are all firm contracts.
It has not been disclosed whether any options are attached. Earlier reports had Wenchong building up to six ships only.
Shipbuilding players said the contracts will be signed in the next few weeks.
Officials at both yards declined to comment, citing contract confidentiality.
The 20 ships will be built to IMO Tier II emission standards. The 1,800-teu vessels will have 250 reefer plugs each, while the larger ships will each have 400 reefer plugs.
Wan Hai is believed to be paying about $27m each for the Bangkokmaxes and $40m apiece for the 2,800-teu vessels.
This is JMU's first containership deal this year.
JMU was formed in early 2013 through the merger of Universal Shipbuilding and IHI Marine United. It is the second-largest shipbuilder in Japan, with six yards, and has outlined a strategy to include ship types that it has not constructed before, so it has a flexible approach to the market.
JMU is likely to task its Kure shipyard in Hiroshima prefecture to build Wan Hai’s vessels, as it has a good record of containership building and is already constructing 14,000-teu neo-panamax boxships for domestic shipowner NYK Line.
Wenchong, which is also well known for containership construction, has received several contracts this year, including from China Navigation and Cape Shipping.
