Corporate | 7 January 2010 10:00
Hamburger Hafen und Logistik AG / Miscellaneous
07.01.2010
Dissemination of a Corporate News, transmitted by
DGAP - a company of EquityStory AG.
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With the expansion of their new Feeder Logistik Zentrale (FLZ) for
feeder-ships, Hamburger Hafen und Logistik AG (HHLA) and EUROGATE are
further strengthening the Port of Hamburg's competitiveness. After its
successful start-up with Unifeeder as its first customer, FLZ as a joint
venture intends to continue investing and gain additional clients. At the
same time HHLA is seeing a stabilization in feeder services in Hamburg.
'With FLZ we are laying on a comprehensive, no-worry package for feedership
operators,' said Heinrich Goller, Managing Director of FLZ and of HHLA
Container Terminals. 'Both for us as terminal operators and for feedership
owners, that's a win-win situation.' FLZ aims to optimize and speed up
feedership clearance in Hamburg and hence to reduce costs for shipping
companies.
Feeder services are of tremendous importance for the Port of Hamburg. At
the various terminals, smaller vessels are known as feederships collect
containers reaching Hamburg with the oceangoing ship from Asia or America,
for instance, and transport these onwards to recipient countries in the
Baltic region, also operating in the reverse order. This calls for
sophisticated port logistics. On average, a ship from overseas unloaded in
Hamburg supplies between 40 and 60 feederships with cargo, for instance.
The same applies to loading. With 45 feeder services, Hamburg possesses the
densest and most powerful feeder and distribution network in Northern
Europe. The Port of Hamburg posts up to 160 feedership sailings per week.
'Hamburg is the leading feeder hub in Northern Europe for the Baltic
region,' said Dr. Stefan Behn, HHLA Executive Board member for the
Container segment.
Following its successful start with Unifeeder as its first customer, FLZ
will continue to invest. 'FLZ is currently in discussion with further
potential customers. And we are very optimistic on that,' says FLZ chief
Goller. FLZ is also currently in talks with operators of inland waterway
craft aimed at improving the link with the Port of Hamburg for these
services.
FLZ is setting benchmarks in the North Range. 'FLZ is unique in the world.
This is an emphatic boost for Hamburg as a feeder hub,' says Bernd Bertram,
manager in Germany for the Danish Unifeeder shipping line that clears the
most of feeder services for the Baltic region in Hamburg. 'Hamburg's
advantages as a transhipment hub are the high quality and flexibility of
feedership clearance that allows for local conditions,' said Bertram.
'Even during the crisis there can be no question for us of stopping
enhancement of the quality of container handling in Hamburg with
innovations such as the FLZ,' says Dr. Stefan Behn, HHLA Executive Board
member. 'With the service improved by FLZ and the resulting shorter
rotation times, in the end we achieve greater customer satisfaction. That
will be decisive for tying existing services to Hamburg and gaining new
ones,' said Dr. Behn.
Based at HHLA Container Terminal Tollerort (CTT), FLZ with its staff of
eight is in continuous contact with HHLA's three large container terminals,
Altenwerder, Burchardkai and Tollerort, EUROGATE Container Terminal Hamburg
and four additional terminals in Hamburg. When a feedership sails into the
Port of Hamburg, FLZ organizes the optimal routing around the terminals by
notifying berths, for example, as well as possible alterations in
rotations, additional cargo bookings or coordination of work processes. 'We
therefore avoid waiting times and boost the productivity of feedership
operators,' said Goller.
The routing of a feedership unloading containers in the Port of Hamburg for
onward carriage by a vessel proceeding overseas, to Asia or America, for
instance, and accepting cargo for onwards transport to Stockholm, can last
for up to two days. Coordination by FLZ can accelerate this round by up to
30 percent. Should a ship from overseas calling at EUROGATE Container
Terminal Hamburg be overdue, that frees capacity there for loading a
feedership. FLZ directs the ship there. Waiting times are eliminated.
'FLZ is an important instrument for coordinating feeder services in the
Port of Hamburg efficiently for all those involved. That saves time and
costs,' according to Peter Zielinski, Managing Director of EUROGATE
Container Terminal Hamburg and a member of FLZ's Advisory Board.
'Especially in difficult times for the economy, time and costs are critical
factors in the equation.'
Owing to the disproportionate collapse of national economies in Eastern
Europe as a consequence of the severe economic crisis, in 2009 Hamburg 2009
posted a marked downturn in feeder services. On top of that, the steep fall
in charter rates and low bunkerage costs temporarily lessened the Port of
Hamburg's geographical advantages, since these factors made feeder services
from the Benelux ports and around the Northern tip of Denmark into the
Baltic region are commercially viable. 'In recent months feeder services in
Hamburg have stabilized. We are hoping for increases in 2010,' said Dr.
Behn of HHLA's Executive Board.
HHLA and EUROGATE set themselves the aim of jointly coordinating and
improving calls by feederships at the Port of Hamburg at an early stage.
Last year the two terminal operators founded a joint company in which HHLA
holds a 67 percent stake and Eurogate one of 33 percent. The Unifeeder
shipping company is FLZ's first customer. 'For all those involved, FLZ
represents immense potential for optimizing container handling,' said Bernd
Bertram, head of Unifeeder in Germany.
Contact:
Matthias Funk
Investor Relations
HAMBURGER HAFEN UND LOGISTIK AG
Bei St. Annen 1, D-20457 Hamburg, www.hhla.de
Tel: +49-40-3088-3397
Fax: +49-40-3088-3339
E-mail: investor-relations@hhla.de
07.01.2010 Ad hoc announcement, Financial News and Media Release distributed by DGAP.
Media archive at www.dgap-medientreff.de and www.dgap.de
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Language: English
Company: Hamburger Hafen und Logistik AG
Bei St. Annen 1
20457 Hamburg
Deutschland
Phone: +49 (0)40-3088-1
Fax: +49 (0)40-3088-3355
E-mail: info@hhla.de
Internet: www.hhla.de
ISIN: DE000A0S8488
WKN: A0S848
Indices: MDAX
Listed: Regulierter Markt in Frankfurt, Hamburg; Freiverkehr in
Berlin, München, Hannover, Düsseldorf, Stuttgart
End of News DGAP News-Service
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