OceanX@Intermodal Europe 2019

OceanX participated in Intermodal Europe 2019, in Hamburg last week. Whilst the event continues to center around hardware and being a meeting point for container manufacturing and trading, it covered a much wider range of subjects during the conference.   

Our director Ruben Huber, shared his views on some key industry trends in the opening session that provided a “Worldwide Overview of the Container Shipping Market”. Before joining Simon Heaney of Drewry, Renzo Hofnagels of ABN AMRO, John Fossey of World Cargo News and Professor Dr. Orestis Schinas of the Hamburg School of Business Administration for the panel discussion, he outlined how the developments around Technology, Specialisation, Omnichannel and Virtualisation are impacting the industry.

On the market discussion, it was a consensus, that the container shipping market will continue to grow, albeit at a slower pace than previously. Rates are expected to rise next year, with Drewry estimating 6.5%, of which 3% are attributed to IMO2020, granting carriers a recovery of 50-75% of related cost. Carriers efforts towards vertical integration will continue but bear a lot of risks and continue to face scepticism.

We also used the opportunity of the exhibition in Hamburg to catch up with several exciting startups in the container shipping sector on our watchlist: from Flowfox.de that is reengineering the container release process to Aeler.com who are reinventing the box and introduce container as a service (CAAS),  4foldcontainers.com that is building a collapsable one for imbalanced trades, HHX.blue that is tackling ship financing and Containerweight.com targeting efficiency around container weight verification. As part of the OceanX incubator program, we continue to support exciting industry innovators, by establishing contacts to our members, bridging ideas and application, fostering industry reinvention.

Intermodal has also been a great forum to interact with and hear from all key IoT and visibility players in industry, with Traxens, Identec Solutions, C Sence, NexxIOT, Globetracker, WMS, Emerson, Orbcomm, all present.

Last but not least, the hardware fraction, with equipment producers, suppliers and traders was all in town and we had some exciting partnership discussions, that will support in particular those of our members operating their own fleets or intending to build them, exploring new business models.

About 2 million TEU of new dry containers are standing in China waiting for employment with some over optimistic orders to blame for. Thus prices and leasing rates are under pressure, while specialised equipment and reefer containers remain in high demand.

Finally, we used the occasion to catch up with local members and friends, learning the latest market news.

Thanks for a great week in Hamburg, see you in Rotterdam next year!

About OceanX

OceanX is a non – exclusive global network of leading ocean freight providers and NVOCCs dedicated to delivering bespoke innovative solutions, in particular on FCL services, LCL consolidation, dangerous goods and chemical logistics, temperature control, as well as project cargo handling.

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