The Hindu Business Line : Hanjin Shipping sets up company in India

Hanjin Shipping India will start operations from April 2007, and around $9,00,000 (Rs 4 crore) would be invested in the India operations, according to industry sources.

Confreight Shipping, the existing shipping agent of Hanjin in India, will continue to serve as the sales agent in Kolkata, Kochi and Tuticorin, according to sources.

Hanjin Shipping India is in line with Hanjin's strategy to expand its direct sales network in Europe and Asia where improved business competency and customer service will be needed to handle the growing cargo volume in the future, according to information available in the Hanjin Web site.

Working details

The company will operate its own sales organisation. Its Mumbai sales office will be converted into a branch office, and Delhi and Chennai sales offices would be established. Hanjin Shipping India is designed to secure a foothold in the large Indian market with a huge growth potential, and proactively respond to the expanding market from a long-term perspective, and make logistics operations more efficient, according to information in the Web site.

Global services

Currently, Hanjin operates one intra-Asia service and one Asia-Europe service calling at Mumbai and Nhava Sheva. A new Singapore-India-US East Coast service is to start from next month. It operates 145 vessels covering 80 major ports in the world.

With its container traffic growing at 15-20 per cent annually in recent years, India is forecast to grow rapidly and emerge as the next China. Hanjin expects to handle about 80,000 TEUs (twenty foot equivalent units) of import/export cargo traffic in the region this year, about a 16 per cent rise from last year's 69,000 TEUs.

Other ventures

Hanjin already established local companies in Valencia (Spain) and Hochiminh (Vietnam) last year and in Bangkok (Thailand) and Colombo (Sri Lanka) this year.

Recently, Hanjin, Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha Ltd, Yang Ming Ltd and United Arab Shipping Co announced a new service linking South East Asia and India, Sri Lanka with the Mediterranean Sea and the US East Coast.

SINA service

The new service, called SINA, will have the following port rotation: Singapore, Colombo, Nhava Sheva, Mundra, Port Said, New York, Norfolk, Savannah, Jeddah and Singapore. The transit time between Nhava Sheva and New York will be 18 days.

It will start from November end deploying eight vessels in the 3,500-4,000 TEU capacity. Providing weekly, fixed weekday service with each of the four parties deploying two vessels, the service will cater for cargo in South East Asia to US East Coast as well as India to US East Coast markets, the company said in its Web site.