Finland’s container shipping firm Containerships has pushed the delivery of its first of four short sea LNG-powered vessels until early 2018 due to a change in the shipyard, the company said.
The Chinese Yangzhou Guoyu Shipyard was initially entrusted with the construction, however the company did not disclose which shipyard has been selected as potential replacement.
Renegotiations of the two company-own-financed vessels and two other vessels are ongoing, the company added.
As a result, the first four of six dual-fuel engine-technology vessels are targeted to be delivered during 2018 instead of 2017 as had been planned.
Each ship is set to accommodate up to 639 units of 45-foot containers and have a total capacity of 1,400 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs).
Containerships will be chartering the ships over the long term; the owner and technical manager will be GNS Shipping/Nordic Hamburg, while Arkon will be the commercial manager and the charter broker. However, in addition to the option of chartering, the company is also considering acquiring the new vessels.
Containerships claims to be the first shortsea container operator in Europe to run ships on LNG.
Containerships has chosen Shell as a key partner to supply and bunker LNG. The contract includes bunkering of LNG for the first four Containerships LNG vessels and the bunkering location will be the Port of Rotterdam.
Containerships Group’s net profit for the first quarter of this year fell to EUR 1. 1 million loss (USD 1.2 million) from a profit of EUR 1.7 million year-on-year. The company’s net sales in the first quarter of 2016 amounted to EUR 49.1 million (€49.5m).
EBITDA was at the same level as last year and EBIT was slightly better than Q1/2015.
Despite challenging market conditions, the company is maintaining its financial targets for 2016 unchanged. Estimated sales growth for 2016 is between 5-10% and the EBITDA target is at least EUR 13 million (a growth of about 50%).
World Maritime News Staff