Sany Port Machinery is part of the Sany Group that manufactures heavy-duty equipment for the ports, construction, mining and energy sectors. Sany Port Machinery produces reach stackers, container handling equipment, yard cranes – including rail-mounted gantry cranes and rubber-tyre mounted gantry cranes – and ship-to-shore cranes. Tracing its origins back to 1906, Gottwald Port Technology is part of the Demag Cranes group. Gottwald’s product range includes mobile harbour cranes, such as portal harbour cranes and floating cranes, automated guided vehicles for horizontal container movements, automated stacking cranes and wide span gantries. PEMA provides a forum and public voice for the global port equipment and technology sectors, reflecting their critical role in enabling safe, secure, sustainable and productive ports and thereby supporting world maritime trade. The Association has steadily expanded its membership in the past three years, with equipment suppliers drawn from all sides of the ports industry. PEMA has also established working groups to focus on key issues for the ports sector within the fields of safety, environment and technology.
Port of Gothenburg signs a ten-year concession agreement
Many companies expressed an interest in running the Gothenburg Car Terminal and around ten external operators were involved in the process. The final choice was Logent – a Swedish logistics company with 1,000 employees which operates ports, combiterminals and storage facilities throughout Sweden and Norway. Logent also handles stevedoring at the Port of Stockholm as well as an industrial college in Gothenburg specialising in logistics. “Logent is an innovative, rapidly growing, knowledge-intensive company that shares our values and visions. Choosing a logistics company is a clear indication of the role played by a modern port. We are part of the logistics chain and through Logent we will gain access to many other parts of that chain, presenting us with significant competitive advantages,” continues Magnus Kårestedt, chief executive of the Port of Gothenburg. “Gothenburg’s geographical location is unbeatable when it comes to serving the whole of Scandinavia and the Baltic countries. We are seeking to reinforce the Car Terminal at the Port of Gothenburg even further in close collaboration with the automotive industry,” states Lars-Göran Ahlberger, President of Logent AB. The background to the move is the division of the Port into a municipal port authority and three separate terminal companies. The quays and infrastructure will remain under municipal ownership and the agreement only applies to operations at the Car Terminal. In October, the Port signed an agreement with DFDS Seaways and C.Ports covering the operation of the Ro-Ro Terminal and next in line in the transfer process is the Container Terminal.
Transfer April 4
Once the concession agreement comes into force, Logent will take over all customer contracts and the 35 employees. The official transfer date is April 4. Because of its size, the deal does not require the approval of the Swedish Competition Authority.
Cars gathering momentum
The handling of cars was the sector that increased most at the Port of Gothenburg last year – up 48 per cent on 2009. In total, 233,000 cars were imported and exported and the upward trend is continuing although there is still some way to go to reach pre-recession figures of 300,000-plus cars passing through the port each year. Shipping of cars and other vehicles to and from other parts of the world will be handled by the Gothenburg Car Terminal, which is now in the process of being transferred. Around one-third of the total car volume at the port last year passed through the Gothenburg Car Terminal as well as 12,200 construction machines, chassis, steel units and other heavy goods. In 2010, the Terminal had a turnover of SEK 71 million.
Testing of berths 8 & 9 begins at Felixstowe
As the first phase of the Felixstowe South development, Berths 8 & 9 will provide an additional 730m of deep-water quay capable of accommodating the world’s largest container ships when it formally opens later in 2011. David Gledhill, Chief Executive Officer of Hutchison Ports (UK) Limited, which owns of the Port of Felixstowe, commented: “It is very exciting to be moving into the testing phase of this major development. There is an increasing trend towards ultra-large container vessels on many services operating between the Far East and Europe and it is essential the UK has the right facilities to accommodate these ships. Berths 8 & 9 will give us that capability and, allied to the unrivalled distribution options available from Felixstowe, will consolidate our position as the UK’s number one port. “There is a lot of equipment to be tested and we need to be sure that all the new systems are resilient before the terminal is formally opened. It is, however, great to see the first mega-vessel alongside the only UK terminal that can handle it fully laden.” With a declared capacity of 14,100 TEU, the CSCL STAR is one of the world’s largest container ships and able to handle a significantly greater number of containers than any other ship currently in the CSCL fleet. The vessel has a length of 366m, and a width of 51.2m, or 20 rows of containers across the deck. Built by Samsung Heavy Industries, and delivered in January 2011, the vessel has a gross tonnage of 150,853, and a draught of 14.5m. The CSCL STAR will be deployed on the AEX1 Service, with a rotation of: Shanghai, Ningbo, Yantian, Port of Felixstowe, Hamburg, Rotterdam, Hong Kong and Shanghai.
Demag Cranes acquires British IT company DB Controls
The customers of the company, which in future will trade exclusively under the brand DBIS, include port and terminal operators in Great Britain, Asia and Africa, among others. The acquisition is part of the parent company’s strategy of expanding its capabilities in the field of bulk materials handling in the Port Technology segment. Thanks to the complementary service portfolio of DB Controls, Demag Cranes is expanding its range of software and consultancy services, previously geared to container terminals in the port and hinterland, to include the area of bulk materials. As a result, customers throughout the world receive a complete package from a single source.
Thomas H. Hagen, Member of the Management Board of Demag Cranes AG and COO, emphasises, “DB Controls’ consulting and software capabilities combined with their automation skills are at the upper end of the services pyramid. This will enable us to strengthen our position in the bulk materials handling market considerably.”