Michael Thamm News

The European cruise company, Costa Group, with its Costa Cruises and AIDA Cruises brands, which is part of Carnival Corporation, has created a dedicated decarbonization department within its Carnival Maritime unit based in Hamburg, Germany.The new department will be responsible for developing and implementing the strategy for achieving the decarbonization ambitions of the Costa and AIDA fleets by 2050. The effort will have a strong focus on research and development, energy management…

Carnival Corporation's Costa Cruises has taken delivery of the new cruise ship Costa Firenze designed and built by Fincantieri at its Marghera shipyard.With 135,500 gross tonnage and a capacity of more than 5,200 guests, the Costa Firenze is part of a €6 billion ($7.3 billion) development plan that includes seven new ships to be delivered for the Costa Group by 2023. Costa Firenze is the fourth of these new ships to be delivered with three more to come.“The handover of the new Costa Firenze is a sign of hope and restart for the whole cruise and tourism ecosystems.

Carnival Corporation announced another set of moves within its global leadership team as part of the company's broader efforts to streamline operations and prepare the organization for the eventual resumption of cruising amid the coronavirus health crisis.Gus Antorcha, currently chief operations officer for the group's Carnival Cruise Line brand, has been named president of the company's Holland America Line, while Neil Palomba, currently president of the company's Italy-based Costa Cruises…

Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) said that its Cruise Lines have invested more than $22 billion in ships with new, energy-efficient technologies and cleaner fuels and achieved substantial progress.“While cruise ships comprise far less than 1% of the global maritime community, cruise lines are at the forefront in developing responsible tourism practices and innovative technologies. Our industry leads in environmental stewardship,” said Michael Thamm, Chairman of CLIA Europe and Group CEO of Costa Group and Carnival Asia.“The entire shipping industry benefits from early adoption of innovative technologies by cruise lines—many of which did not exist five to 10 years ago such as exhaust gas cleaning systems (EGCS)…

Fincantieri's Monfalcone shipyard handed over Costa Venezia - built specially for Chinese guests - to Costa Cruises, the Italian brand of Carnival Corporation, the world's largest cruise company.The handover took place yesterday in the presence of Italy's Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Matteo Salvini and Deputy Minister of Infrastructure and Transport Edoardo Rixi, as well as Carnival Corp. & plc and Costa Group officials.With a gross tonnage of 135,500 tonnes, the 323-meter-long Costa Venezia offers 2,116 cabins for a total of 5,260 passengers and will be the largest among Costa's fleet in China.The ship is part of an expansion plan that includes 7 new ships arriving for the Costa Group by 2023…

Carnival Corporation & plc (NYSE/LSE: CCL; NYSE: CUK), has announced that its cruise joint venture with China State Shipbuilding Corporation (CSSC) will launch this week under the name CSSC Carnival Cruise Shipping Limited. The new China-based cruise company plans to operate its own fleet to serve Chinese cruise guests by the end of 2019.CSSC Carnival Cruise Shipping Limited announced an agreement to purchase two existing ships from Carnival Corporation’s Costa Group, the leading cruise operator in Europe and Asia.

Carnival Maritime GmbH has announced  that Dr Hermann J. Klein has been appointed as its new Managing Director, starting September 1st, 2018. Klein is currently Managing Director and Group COO of CPO Holding (Offen Group) in Hamburg, Germany. He will be succeeding Lars Ljoen, who will join Carnival Cruise Lines in Miami, USA, as Head of Marine Operations. Carnival Maritime is the marine service unit for Costa Group with its brands AIDA Cruises, Costa Cruises, and Costa Asia. “Hermann Klein is a long-standing, well recognized executive of the maritime industry and has the perfect background and profound marine experience to further drive innovation and operational excellence across our fleet,” said Michael Thamm, Group CEO, Costa Group and Carnival Asia.

Costa Group – part of Carnival Corporation & plc, the world’s largest cruise company – announced that its new generation ships, the first LNG powered at sea, will call Marseille in 2019. The Costa Group, the leading tourism group, the No. 1 cruiser in Europe has renovated its commitment to Port of Marseille through different initiatives that began in 1996 when the new cruise called “La Dolce Vita” started its weekly operations from Marseille to offer the French guests every Saturday a brand new and unique experience in the best places of the Mediterranean onboard its ship Costa Romantica. This new offer launched by Costa contributed to the French people being more and more interested in experiencing a cruise vacation.

Carnival Corporation’s Italian brand Costa Cruises held a coin ceremony for its newest ship, Costa Venezia, which is being built to service the Chinese market from 2019. The new 135,500-ton cruise liner is being built by Italy-based shipbuilder Fincantieri, and is the first Vista-class ship specifically designed and built for China. Michael Thamm, CEO of Costa Group and Carnival Asia, said, “The Costa Venezia demonstrates our strong commitment and confidence in the world’s fastest growing cruise market.

While the cruise industry grows globally in earnest, this maritime niche is under the microscope like no other, operating high profile, high design billion dollar ships in and out of some of the most pristine places on the planet. Tasked to keep the company’s ships running efficiently and environmentally sound is John Haeflinger, VP of maritime policy and analysis, who directly oversees the sustainability team at Carnival Corp. Haeflinger shares with Maritime Reporter & Engineering News his insights on the tech and technique to keep today and tomorrow’s fleet running clean and efficient.

German shipbuilder Meyer Werft has laid the keel for AIDAnova, set to become the first cruise ship worldwide that will operate both at sea and in port fueled with liquefied natural gas (LNG). With AIDAnova’s first building block lowered into place on September 6, 2017, Carnival Corporation & plc officially marked the start of construction of seven fully LNG powered cruise ships due to be commissioned between 2018 and 2022 for four of its 10 cruise ship brands. The seven vessels for Carnival Cruise Lines…

AIDA Cruises has taken delivery of the 12th vessel of its fleet, AIDAperla, from Japanese shipbuilder Mitshubishi Heavy Industries (MHI). The vessel was commissioned April 27 at a ceremony in Nagasaki, Japan in the presence of Michael Thamm, CEO Costa Group; Felix Eichhorn, President AIDA Cruises; Shunichi Miyanaga, President and CEO MHI; and Kazuaki Kimura, President and CEO, Industry & Infrastructure MHI. In the coming days AIDAperla will set sail for the Mediterranean where the vessel will be christened by model and presenter Lena Gercke on June 30, 2017, in Palma de Mallorca.

Fincantieri, China State Shipbuilding Corporation (CSSC) and Carnival Corporation & plc signed a binding Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) for the construction of two cruise ships, with an option for additional four, the first units of the kind ever built in China for the Chinese market. The parties signed the MoA on behalf of the joint venture between Fincantieri and CSSC Cruise Technology Development Co., Ltd (CCTD), of the joint venture between Carnival Corporation and CSSC, and of the shipyard Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding Co., Ltd (SWS).

American/British owned German cruise line AIDA Cruises has launched its first marketing campaign on the Chinese market. From April 2017, with AIDAbella, AIDA Cruises will, for the first time, deploy a ship in China all year round and, in close cooperation with Costa Asia, be offering cruise vacation “Made in Germany” from Shanghai as a new product for the booming Chinese market. Michael Thamm, CEO of the Costa Group, said, “The ongoing growth of AIDA has made Germany the second biggest cruise market in the world.

Following on a March 2015 agreement and a memorandum of agreement last December, Fincantieri, a leader in cruise ship design and construction, and Carnival Corporation & plc, the world’s largest cruise company, have finalized contracts for the construction of five next-generation passenger ships. The contracts finalized today envisage one further unit compared to the memorandum of agreement of December and mark the most important goal reached by the two groups in the last years, having a total value which exceeds 3 billion euros. Crucial, once more, for the finalization of the agreement, the supporting of the export credit system lead by Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (Cdp).

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. (MHI) completed delivery of the AIDAprima, the first of two large cruise ships being built for AIDA Cruises at MHI's Nagasaki Shipyard & Machinery Works. A ceremony to mark the occasion was attended by Michael Thamm, CEO of the Costa Group, and Felix Eichhorn, President of AIDA Cruises, representing the new owner, and Shunichi Miyanaga, President and CEO, and Yoichi Kujirai, Senior Executive Vice President and President/CEO of Commercial Aviation & Transportation Systems, representing MHI.

While the term ‘pioneer’ is oftentimes loosely bandied about, there is no more accurate term to describe Jochen Deerberg, an environmental pioneer of the maritime industry, founder of Oldenburg, Germany-based Deerberg-Systems, who was recently feted by cruise industry luminaries at his farewell dinner late last year. “To start in 1979 one could see that environmental-waste management problems on shore and especially in the maritime industry would be of great importance in the future,” said Deerberg. “Of course, I was 10 years too early with my idea.

Carnival Corporation & plc today announced that Roger Chen has been appointed chairman in China, effective January 1, 2016. A native of China, Chen will be based in Shanghai and lead all government relations and port development, while also supporting the company’s joint ventures in China. In this new role, Chen will have responsibility for representing all of Carnival Corporation’s brands in China to continue growing the company’s presence and scale in the region. Chen will report directly to Alan Buckelew…

Digital support, surveillance and planning for all technical and nautical aspects of the 25 vessels of Costa Crociere, Costa Asia and AIDA fleets are implemented in real time by the Costa Group. Now assisting with these operations and risk/safety management is a new marine service unit, Carnival Maritime, which became fully operational today in Hamburg. “By founding Carnival Maritime, we invested in the most elaborated technologies to create a marine operations unit that supports our captains the best possible way,” explained Michael Thamm, CEO of the Costa Group.

Carnival Corporation & plc announced that Michael Ungerer, currently President of Germany-based AIDA Cruises, has been appointed Chief Operations Officer-Shared Services for Carnival Asia, effective September 1, 2015. Ungerer will relocate to Shanghai, China, and directly support each of the Carnival Corporation brands operating in the region to leverage the company's industry-leading presence and scale in the region. Ungerer will jointly report to Michael Thamm, CEO of the Costa Group, which includes AIDA Cruises and Costa Cruises, and to a China steering committee comprising the Carnival Corporation brands operating in the region. In addition, longtime AIDA senior executive Felix Eichhorn has been named president of AIDA Cruises. He will also report to Thamm.

Carnival Corporation has signed a multi-billion dollar contract to build four next-generation cruise ships with the largest guest capacity in the world. The four new ships will be the cruise industry's largest yet—but only in head count, not in size. The new vessels are capable of accommodating 6,600 passengers alongside hundreds of crew members. The large-capacity cruise ships will set sail between 2019 and 2022. The 180,000 gross ton cruise ships will also feature a revolutionary "green cruising" design. The ships will be the first in the cruise industry to be powered at sea by Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) - the world's cleanest burning fossil fuel, representing a major environmental breakthrough.

Carnival Corporation & plc, Meyer Werft and Meyer Turku today announced a multi-billion Euro contract for four 180,000 gross ton large next-generation cruise ships. The ships will feature a revolutionary “green cruising” design and will be the first-ever cruise ships powered at sea by Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG). Two of the ships will be built for AIDA Cruises at Meyer Werft in Papenburg, Germany and two further ships will be built at Meyer Turku, Finland. With these orders, Meyer Turku has secured a long term order book until 2020 – providing a stable and increasing work load that allows the yard and the Finnish maritime cluster to develop themselves.

A unit of one of the world's biggest cruise operators sought to reassure Italy on Friday that plans to transfer some of its operations to Germany did not mean it would move abroad. Costa Cruises, part of Carnival Corp, is based in the northern Italian port of Genoa, but transport workers union FIT-CISL fears the company's transfer plan spells job losses. Unions are concerned that the transfer of four Costa Cruises units to Hamburg would result in the loss of about 160 jobs and…