Greek shipping king Evangelos Marinakis plans to place its first containership contract with a Chinese shipyard after a two years.
Capital Group, the shipping company owned by Evangelos Marinakis, will spend more than US$1.3 billion (roughly Rs. 9.422 billion) to build 10 new 8,400-TEU liquefied natural gas (LNG) dual-fuel-powered containerships at a Chinese shipyard, according to Trade Winds.
Capital Group has signed a provisional contract with New Times Shipbuilding for 10 8,400 TEU LNG dual-fuel powered mid-sized containerships, priced at more than $130 million each and expected to be delivered one after the other from early 2027 to 2028, sources said. If the order is confirmed, it will be Capital’s first containership contract after a two years. The order is contingent upon the planned construction of a new dock by New Times Shipbuilding.
It is reported that Capital Group’s last containership order can be traced back to February 2022, when it signed a contract with Dalian Shipbuilding Industry Co.,LTD. (DSIC) under China State Shipbuilding Corporation (CSSC) for the construction of 4+2 7100TEU containerships, with a total value of nearly US$480 million, and scheduled to be delivered in June 2024 one after the other.
The official website shows that New Times Shipbuilding is located in Xingang industrial Park Jingjiang City, Jiangsu Province of China, 10 km downstream from Jiangyin Bridge. It covers an area of 1,600,000 sqm, the total length of its shoreline is 3200 meters and the sum of its total assets is about 20 billion RMB. The yard currently has the capacity of construction of 100,000~300,000 tonnes class ships and can deliver upto 5million DWT annually.
New Times Shipbuilding consists of its own independent marine design and research & development department, and an internal technique center which is approved by the relevant Government authorities and has the capacity to make detailed and production design. At present, the yard has 3 drydocks, 3 outfiting jetties and surrounding support facilities. The main product portfolio is focus on three main conventional vessels, i.e. Bulker, Chemical/Oil Tanker and Containerships. It covers any tonners with panama beam or above (for more details, please resort to the later introduction of our products), among them the panamax tanker, Suezmax Tanker, Capsize and Newcastle bulkers have reached world-leading level.
At present, New Times Shipbuilding is focusing on the tanker market. Clarkson data shows that all the orders for 37 new vessels undertaken by New Times Shipbuilding in 2023 are for oil tankers, and last year the amount of hand-held orders for oil tankers amounted to 59 vessels, counting 1.7 million compensated gross tonnage (CGT), which ranked first among the shipyards in the world; so far this year all the publicized orders for new vessels are also from this market.
It is understood that Capital Group is one of the top five large-scale shipping companies in Greece, with strong strength and active investment. It now holds more than 100 ship assets, and is committed to promoting environmental upgrading of the fleet and leading the green development of the industry. Since the launch of the green transformation program six years ago, Capital Group has ordered about 80 new vessels, with a total order value of nearly US$9.5 billion.
During the Posidonia 2024 maritime event held in Athens, Capital Group also signed a contract with DSIC for two 307,000 DWT LNG dual-fuel VLCCs, which are the options for the 4+2 LNG dual-fuel powered VLCCs that were signed in January 2024, with a total value of six vessels worth approximately $840 million, for delivery starting from the end of 2026 onwards.