What advantages do megacarriers bring to the production-distribution system? This is the real issue. If giant ships cause problems for a terminal that is not a transhipment or dedicated terminal, they can cause even greater problems or, at the very least, are of no benefit to the efficiency of the logistics chain. It is not true, for instance, that the introduction of ULCCs enables final destination ports to be served by direct lines. The opposite may well be true: the bigger the size of the ship the more reasonable transhipment becomes, especially in the Mediterranean. UNCTAD’s Liner Shipping...

“Marco Polo” and terminals Observing the official itinerary and the cutoff times indicated in the first round trip, that departing from Ningbo on 24 January, as per the MSC website, it is noted that the ship does not stay in any port for longer than 24 hours. The terminal must therefore work very efficiently, dedicating itself almost exclusively to the “great ship”. The logic of this itinerary can be seen more clearly by looking not only at the ports but also the managers of the terminals visited. There appears to be a preferential relationship with the Emirates and with DP World, their arm in...

“We are not interested in the US market anymore,” followed a day later by claims that the statement was interpreted incorrectly and that they have no intention of leaving the US market. The two statements from Huawei, the world’s largest provider of telecommunications products and services, shook analysts and made waves in political circles. The Shenzhen-based giant has been trying to penetrate the US market for years, but the door has been repeatedly shut in their face for political reasons, without considering the economic value of the company, or its technical capabilities.   The stakes...

Dr. Kai Pflug, CEO, Management Consulting Chemicals (Ltd.), Dr. Bernhard Hartmann, Managing Director, A.T. Kearney China Sherri He, Partner, Head PE Practice, A.T. Kearney China  Introduction Private equity (PE) consists of investors making investments directly into private companies or public companies [note 1]typically, the investors are institutional, so they can commit large sums of money for long periods of time (typically 3-8 years)[note 2] as PE investments often demand long holding periods. This paper gives an introduction into PE in the chemical industry, both on the global level and with...

Can we be certain that a modern port has to plan for its development based on the growing size of containerships? Perhaps the time has come to ask what sort of advantages these vessels bring to the production and distribution system. Slower, less flexible, uncontrollable in the event of accidents, they may pose a danger to ports rather than an opportunity. If port investments do not attract private funding, we might say that so-called project financing is too often a joke, indeed it adds to the costs borne by public finance and fails to guarantee building quality. For this reason it is necessary to...