CMA CGM reaches 4 Million Teus landmark

MARSEILLE : French container shipping giant CMA CGM GROUP (Official) has reached this week 4 Mn Teu of operated capacity, a landmark figure cementing the group’s position as the world’s third largest container carrier, behind MSC Mediterranean Shipping Co (6.7 Mteu) and Maersk (4.6M teu). Owned by the Saade family, CMA CGM has quadrupled its size in the last 16 years, having reached its first million teu of operated capacity in June 2009, then hitting 2 Mteu in 2016 and 3 Mteu in 2021.

The carrier’s formidable expansion since its modest beginnings in 1978 was achieved through both organic and external growth, with high-profile shipping lines acquisitions such as French state-owned CGM in 1996, Australian national carrier ANL in 1998, French West African specialist Delmas in 2005 and US carrier American President Line (APL) in 2016.

CMA CGM also bought a number of regional carriers including MacAndrews (2002), Cheng Lie Navigation (2007), U.S. Lines (2007), COMANAV (2007), OPDR (2014), Mercosul Line (2017), Sofrana Unilines (2017) and Containerships Oy (2018). The Marseilles-based shipping line and its regional branches operate globally a massive fleet of 683 container vessels either owned or chartered, with capacities ranging from the small feeder ship of 125 teu to LNG-powered ‘Megamaxes’ of nearly 24,000 teu, such as the emblematic ships of the CMA CGM JACQUES SAADE class.

In addition, CMA CGM has an impressive orderbook, consisting of 95 container vessels for a total capacity of 1.5 Mteu. It is the second largest orderbook in the industry just behind MSC, which has a whopping 135 vessels on order for a total of 2.2 Mteu. Among others, the CMA CGM orderbook includes twelve ‘Megamaxes’ of the 24,000 teu family, and over thirty ships of 19,000 teu, all of which will be LNG-powered.

The huge orderbook of CMA CGM is putting the French line in a position to potentially kick out Maersk of its position as the world’s second largest container carrier, the Danish line having said many times that it was not planning to grow its fleet much above its present level of around 4.6 Mteu. Its current orderbook of 682,000 teu is mainly destined for replacing existing tonnage, the Danish carrier explained.