Hanjin Shipping exclusives getting noticed

I think I have typed more words on Hanjin Shipping in one week than on any other shipping line in a five-day period during 16 years of covering the shipping industry. Fortunately, the blistered fingertips of our news team have earned Splash incredible viewership figures in the 10 days since the Korean line went bankrupt and we have been contacted by major TV news networks following our string of exclusives on container shipping’s biggest ever bankruptcy.

A lot of brilliant observations and tip offs, I can reveal, come from our new interactive forum, Splash Chat. On Monday we hosted a live Q&A on Splash Chat where participants were told there might be just six global container carriers by the mid-2020s. For our full Hanjin archive, click here.

Funnily enough, despite all the Hanjin news, it was not our single most popular story of the week.

Step forward, Effissimo! This Japanese fund run out of Singapore looks like it will soon move to take over one of the world’s largest shipping lines, Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha (K Line), a story that garnered thousands of reads worldwide.

In the Contributions section of the site – always a treasure trove of interesting views and features – I am delighted to say that it was the writings of two shipowners that dominated this week. Khalid Hashim’s magisterial work on what China’s One Belt, One Road initiative actually means proved a big hit. The Precious Shipping boss had certainly done his research and astonishing statistics he presented about this intercontinental infrastructure program were widely shared on social media.

As was Nick Fisher’s great article demanding shipping close the gender imbalance. The Masterbulk head called on fellow shipowners to make sure more women are involved in our industry. “Expecting change to happen by itself is unrealistic, and setting targets and KPIs is also inappropriate,” Fisher noted, adding: “However, it should be a board room topic, and change needs to be driven from the top.”

Finally, in the Opinion section, top billing fell to our finance go-to guy, Dagfinn Lunde, who helped set the scene at this week’s SMM fair in Hamburg by taking a look at the German ship finance scene.

So that was the week that was … and now time to type more on Hanjin!