Carrier Contracts News

Austal USA welcomed U.S. Navy Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Admiral Michael Gilday at the company’s Mobile, Ala. shipyard. The CNO toured the shipyard’s facility and discussed the company’s growing diversity of design and shipbuilding contracts. During his tour, the CNO witnessed the production of both steel and aluminum ships in the company’s 867,000-sq. ft. module manufacturing facility, including operations supporting the submarine industrial base.Austal USA leadership briefed the CNO on the company’s involvement in several autonomous surface vessel programs…

Partner Andreas Silcher in Haynes and Boone’s London office represented TMS Cardiff Gas in its contract with Hyundai Heavy Industries of Korea (HHI) for the construction of one 174,000 cubic meter LNG carrier with XDF propulsion, plus an option for a second vessel. In a press release, TMS Cardiff Gas called the order the first in the company’s X Carrier Series of orders, which expands the company’s fleet of managed vessels to 10. The vessel is scheduled for delivery in 2020, when she will enter into a seven-year time charter contract with TOTAL Gas & Power Chartering, Limited. Andreas also represented TMS Cardiff Gas on the charter contract.

International transport and logistics executives are increasingly benchmarking their companies’ costs and supplier terms in ocean transport contracts, according to data gathered by Drewry Supply Chain Advisors. In the past 6 months, the ocean transport spend under carrier contracts benchmarked by Beneficial Cargo Owners via the Drewry Benchmarking Club global initiative increased by 50%, to $2.2 billion; the number of benchmarked routes rose by 81% and the volume of benchmarked dry container teu jumped by 67%. FMCG companies and retailers are generally ahead of industrial manufacturers when it comes to using benchmarking to negotiate contracts.

CargoSphere, a cloud-based global rate management solution and confidential Rate Mesh for the ocean and air transportation and logistics industries, has announced that Freight Logistics, a global freight forwarder and logistics service provider, has implemented the CargoSphere technology platform. Freight Logistics is now self-managing air and ocean carrier contracts using CargoSphere’s SUDS (Smart Upload and Diagnostic Solution) and is receiving rates over CargoSphere’s Web-based, real-time Rate Mesh from carriers, NVOs and the NCBFAA-SA.

CargoSphere,  cloud-based global rate management solution and confidential Rate Mesh network for the ocean and air transportation and logistics industries, has announced the completion of Blu Logistics’ integration with CargoSphere’s freight rate management solution. Blu Logistics, a global logistics company offering sea and air freight services, customs brokerage, ground transportation, and warehousing, previously outsourced freight rate and contract management. By changing over to a self-managed system Blu Logistics has significantly reduced the cost of managing this business process area.

A strong continuation in the recovery of LNG expenditure is underway worldwide, driven by a growing demand for natural gas. The new eighth edition of Douglas-Westwood’s (DW) World LNG Market Forecast expects that global capital expenditure (Capex) will total nearly $228B during the 2013-2017 period. The surge includes capital expenditure on base-load onshore and offshore fixed LNG liquefaction, LNG carriers and LNG regasification, via both onshore and offshore fixed import terminals.

Smart Upload and Diagnostic Solution (SUDS) automates carrier contract and amendment management and processing with smart, diagnostic mapping intelligence for a faster, streamlined workflow. CargoSphere, cloud-based global rate management solution and confidential rate mesh network for the ocean and air transportation and logistics industries, introduced SUDS (Smart Upload and Diagnostics Solution), intelligent technology that reads external rate data directly from any carrier contract format and loads it into a rate system database. SUDS quickly and effectively automates the time-consuming and tedious task of managing and processing carrier contracts and numerous contract amendments. SUDS is a major advancement in the processing of large volumes of external freight rates.

ABB contracted to provide energy-efficient and environmental friendly solution for four LNG vessels to be built in Korea. Total orders in the first quarter of 2013 landed by ABB, worth close to $40 million, came from three gas transportation industry players and are for the supply of power and electric propulsion equipment for LNG vessels to be built in South Korea. ABB will supply its propulsion plant to work in combination with a duel fuel diesel engine plant on board a 155,000 cu m capacity LNG carrier ordered from Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) by a South East Asian ship owner.

Huntington Ingalls Industries (NYSE:HII) announced today that nine employees from its Newport News Shipbuilding and Ingalls Shipbuilding divisions were recognized for achievements in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) during the 27th annual Black Engineer of the Year Award STEM Global Competitiveness Conference. This year's conference is being held at the Washington Marriott in Wardman Park through Saturday. Theodore A. Bush is an electrical engineer at Ingalls Shipbuilding. He has played a key role in his group's contribution to the Large Deck Amphibious (LDA) Program and the Navy's newest fleet of the San Antonio-class amphibious assault ships. Bush earned a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Alabama A&M University. Tennyson D.

Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) & its affiliated shipyard obtain orders totalling US$1.05 billion to build five liquefied natural gas (LNG) carriers. One of the LNG carriers of 155,000-cubic-metre capacity and worth US$210 million is for Brunei Gas, reports the Oman Daily Observer. HHI's affiliated shipyard, Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries, also won a contract for four 174,000-cubic-metre LNG carriers valued at $840 million from Greece’s Maran Gas. The contract included an option exercisable by the owner for two additional same-class LNG carriers. The LNG carriers, scheduled to be delivered between 2015 and 2016, will feature dual fuel diesel engine system (DFDE) which allows the ships to run either on diesel fuel or natural gas.

COSCO shipyards in Guandung and Zhoushan obtain bulk carrier orders worth $198M  COSCO (Guangdong) Shipyard has been contracted by a European company to build a 35,000 dwt bulk carrier scheduled for delivery in the first quarter of 2013. Separately, COSCO (Zhoushan) Shipyard has secured two contracts and four option contracts from another European company to build a total of six units of 64,000 dwt bulk carriers with eco-friendly and fuel-efficient designs. The two contracts will become effective following approval from the shipbuilder's board of directors.

Excel Maritime Carriers Ltd. (NYSE: EXM), an owner and operator of dry bulk carriers and an international provider of worldwide seaborne transportation  services for dry bulk cargoes, has entered into four new period charter agreements  for four of its Kamsarmax vessels. - Each of the Kamsarmax M/V Ore Hansa (82,209 dwt; built in 2006), M/V Coal Gypsy (82,221 dwt; built in 2006) and M/V Iron Brooke (82,594 dwt; built in 2007) has been fixed for a period of 10 – 13 months at a gross daily rate of $11,250. - 53% coverage of the entire fleet at an average TCE rate of $16,114.

Container lines achieved a record high on-time service reliability performance, according to Drewry Container Shipper Insight’s latest quarterly schedule monitoring survey, just published. Out of nearly 1,700 ships tracked in the three months between 1 April to 30 June, 69% arrived either on the scheduled day of arrival or a day prior, the best result since Drewry began its schedule reliability survey at the end of 2005. The average on-time results as measured by Drewry have been steadily increasing since the October-December 2008 monitoring period and the latest score compares to the previous best of 60% achieved in the January-March 2009 window. The average time deviation, or delay, from the scheduled day of arrival is also heading in the right direction.

The Samsung Heavy Industries Co., has won a $1.14b deal to build four liquefied natural gas (LNG) carriers. The deal from Qatar Gas Transport Co. Ltd. calls for Samsung Heavy to build the four carriers worth $286 million each by February 2010, the company said in a regulatory filing. Meanwhile, the Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co., the world's third-largest shipyard, said Monday it had received a $1.22 billion order to build five LNG carriers. The deal calls for Daewoo Shipbuilding to also supply four of the five carriers to Qatar Gas Transport Co. Ltd., and one to an unidentified European company. Source: Asia Pulse

Diana Shipping Inc. assumed shipbuilding contracts from two unnamed parties for construction of two Capesize dry bulk carriers for $120.8 million. The carriers, priced at $60.4 million each, will be built by Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding Co. and are expected to be delivered during the second quarter of 2010. Capesize carriers are a shipping designation for vessels which must travel around Africa's Cape of Good Hope because they are too large for transit of the Suez Canal. Diana Shipping also said it arranged with Fortis Bank a $62 million secured term loan, which the company plans to use to pay pre-delivery installments for the dry bulk carriers. Diana noted that the loan requires no principal payments before delivery of the ships and may be refinanced then. (Source: AP)