Maersk and Hapag-Loyd form new partnership

Hapag-Lloyd and Maersk have signed an agreement for a new long-term operational collaboration called “Gemini Cooperation”, which will start in February 2025.

The new cooperation between Hapag-Lloyd and Maersk will comprise a fleet pool of around 290 vessels with a combined capacity of 3.4 million containers (TEU); Maersk will deploy 60 percent and Hapag-Lloyd 40 percent. It will cover seven trades: Asia/US West Coast, Asia/US East Coast, Asia/Middle East, Asia/Mediterranean, Asia/North Europe, Middle East–India/Europe and Transatlantic.

The cooperation will include 26 mainline services. The network will be centered around 12 key hub ports (10 owned and/or controlled terminals and two highly efficient operations in Singapore and Cartagena). An additional 32 dedicated regional shuttle services will connect these key hubs. That includes 14 shuttle services in Europe, four in the Middle East, 13 in Asia and one in the Gulf of Mexico.

“Teaming up with Maersk will help us to further boost the quality we deliver to our customers. Additionally, we will benefit from efficiency gains in our operations and joint efforts to further accelerate the decarbonisation of our industry,” says Rolf Habben Jansen, CEO of Hapag-Lloyd.

As a part of the agreement, the two companies have set the target of delivering schedule reliability of above 90 percent once the network is fully phased in. In a statement the two lines said customers will also benefit from improved transit times in many major port-to-port corridors and access to some of the world’s best connected ocean hubs.

“We are pleased to enter this cooperation with Hapag-Lloyd, which is the ideal ocean partner on our strategic journey. By entering this cooperation, we will be offering our customers a flexible ocean network that will be raising the bar for reliability in the industry. This will strengthen our integrated logistics offering and meet our customers’ needs,” said Vincent Clerc, CEO of Maersk.

Both companies are committed to the decarbonization of their fleets and have set the most ambitious decarbonization targets in the industry with Maersk aiming for net-zero in 2040 and Hapag-Lloyd in 2045.

Hapag-Lloyd will leave THE Alliance end of January 2025. In January 2023, Maersk and MSC announced that the 2M alliance will end in January 2025.

During 2024, Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd will plan the transition from their current alliances to the new operational cooperation. Concurrently, service to customers will continue along existing agreements.