MSC And Maersk Disengage Ahead Of Schedule.

Although the 2M Alliance will be dissolved by the end of next year, MSC and Maersk fleets are now “disconnected” to deploy ships on their respective routes.

This sparked speculation that the two shipping companies would agree to terminate the Alliance’s shipping-sharing alliance in advance.

Alphaliner said: “The previous service was operated by a MSC-Maersk vessel mix, now gradually changing to leaving only one vessel operator per route.”

For example, on the Asia-Northern European trade routes, Sea's data confirms that Maersk is the only ship operator on the AE5/Albatross, AE10/Silk, and AE7/Condor routes and that the MSC of Mediterranean Navigation is the ship operator of the AE55/Griffin and AE6/Lion routes; besides, Mediterranean Navigation also has its own independent service, Swan MSC.

With a current fleet of 5.5 million TEU and a large order book of around 1.5 million TEU, MSC has taken delivery of two new-build 24,000 TEU mega-vessels this month and will be able to operate independently at short notice if required.

Maersk's methanol-powered new buildings will be delivered and put into operation starting next year, and the company does not want to share them with other shipping lines and will be able to support its independent East-West trade service network, according to Alphaliner's report.

Indeed, Maersk's CEO, Vincent Clerc, has repeatedly stated that the company is not seeking to join or form another ship-sharing alliance, as ship-sharing agreements are not in line with the company's vision of becoming a global integrated service provider.

Alphaliner believes that "the dissolution of the 2M Alliance will bring deep structural changes to the liner market." The agency also assessed the future prospects of two other shipping alliances. Ocean Alliance, the ocean coalition of CMA CGM, COSCO (including OOCL), and Evergreen, is already the largest ship-sharing alliance, with a total shared capacity of 4.22 million TEUs, while THE Alliance's partners, Hapag-Lloyd, ONE, Yang Ming, and HMM, have a total shared capacity of about 3.1 million TEU, which is comparable to the total shared capacity of the 2M Alliance.

In addition, the Ocean Alliance members have a large order book of vessels, with 2.38 million TEUs to be delivered next year, including 36 mega-vessels that will be put into the Asia-Europe trade routes.

Despite the European Commission's recent decision not to renew the Block Block Exemption Regulation (CBER) for liner shipping next April and the fact that shipping alliances will remain a legitimate way for carriers to work together, Alphaliner speculates on whether the Ocean Alliance's planned large-scale expansion will be a serious test of the new regulatory order.

Alphaliner said it could "become a test case for how large alliances are allowed to grow".