HMM (011200.KS), South Korea's largest container shipping company, will introduce a hub-and-spoke strategy on Asia-Northern Europe routes starting April next year, focusing on high-traffic hub ports while building feeder networks.
The Premier Alliance, comprising HMM, ONE (Japan), and Yang Ming (Taiwan), announced the new service operation plan on Wednesday.
The most notable change in the plan, which covers major routes including Northern Europe, the Mediterranean, North America, Asia, and the Middle East, is the restructuring of Northern Europe routes. The Premier Alliance will reduce port calls from the previous practice of calling at multiple ports directly, focusing instead on key hub ports with concentrated cargo volumes. The alliance plans to establish feeder networks at these hub ports.
The routes undergoing the biggest changes are the FE3 (Far East Europe 3) and FE4 routes, where HMM's 24,000-TEU ultra-large container vessels are deployed.
The FE3 route will reduce port calls from 11 to 8. The ports of call are Qingdao (China) - Ningbo (China) - Yantian (China) - Singapore - Algeciras (Spain) - Felixstowe (UK) - Hamburg (Germany) - Antwerp (Belgium).
The FE4 route will reduce port calls from 13 to 5, shortening cargo transit times. The ports of call are Shanghai (China) - Busan (South Korea) - Rotterdam (Netherlands) - Hamburg - Le Havre (France).
For ports excluded from the hub network, including Kaohsiung (Taiwan) and Xiamen (China), the three Premier Alliance members plan to jointly launch new feeder services.
"This service restructuring is not merely a route change but a strategic decision to provide customers with predictable services," an HMM official said. "We will elevate our service competitiveness through the hub-and-spoke strategy."
