Nan Tsing Container Lines on the rocks, suspends operations
Nan Tsing Container Lines, one of China’s largest domestic container shipping companies, has sent notice to all of its employees that the company has suspended operations due to heavy debt issues amid the continued doldrums in the domestic container shipping sector.
A number of Nan Tsing vessels have been detained according to local media, and the company will start asset and debt evaluation work and the severance of employees imminently.
Nan Tsing Container Lines started as a state-run shipping company and was on of verge of bankruptcy in 2008. It survived after it was acquired by Zhejiang Tingyu Group, a multi-sector group based in Wenzhou and Pan Peicong (pictured), president of Tingyu Group, was installed as president of the company.
Pan recently told Splash in an exclusive interview that Nan Tsing had set up shipping hubs in Jinzhou and Yantai in the north, Haikou, Guangzhou and Xiamen in the south, Chongqing in the west, Wuhan in the middle, and Shanghai in the east. “Now we can ship cargo to Harbin in the northern edge of the country, and Chongqing and Kunming in the western reaches,” she explained.
At one stage Nan Tsing had a fleet of more than 140, although it had since been downsized to about 40 vessels.