The maritime industry in Hamburg announced three positive news last week. First, CMA CGM, the world’s third-largest shipping company, will acquire a 20% stake in a large container terminal in the port of Hamburg, belonging to operator Eurogate. Secondly, Eurogate competitor HHLA reported a significant increase in TEU volumes processed during the first three quarters of the year, despite U.S. tariff policy and its dampening impact on international trade and global supply chains. Thirdly, shipping line Hapag-Lloyd announced the order of up to 22 new vessels and a significant leap in schedule reliability on those hub-and-spoke routes served by the Gemini Alliance, jointly managed by H-L and its partner Maersk.
The fact that the city also praised plans to construct a new, futuristic opera house at the shores of the Elbe River, privately co-financed by Hamburg billionaire Michael Kühne (K+N), rounded off the good news coming from Germany’s second-largest metropolis after Berlin.
Further TEU growth
As for the deal between CMA CGM and Eurogate, the French shipping company will call at the port of Hamburg more frequently in the future, significantly increasing import and export volumes from four million to an estimated six million standard containers (TEU) per year. In addition, the investment will also be used to expand the infrastructure. This said, 38 hectares of a deepwater area will be added to Eurogate’s premises in the harbor, creating more space for next-generation container ships. To ensure that CMA CGM vessels can dock without any problems, there are also plans to build a new quay measuring 1,050 meters in the western part of the harbor.
A deal based on personal relations
In addition to financial and strategic considerations, the agreement now announced between CMA CGM and Eurogate is based on a long-standing friendship between the two owner families. Thomas Eckelmann from Eurogate subsidiary Eurokai indicated this in a statement: “Our friendship with the Rodolphe Saadé family, owners of CMA CGM, is lasting for years. So we have been discussing a close collaboration for some time.”
Simultaneously to the above deal, the Hamburg-based logistics group and terminal operator HHLA announced a 12.5% increase in revenue and profit for the first nine months of the year, from €1.18 billion in the previous year to €1.33 billion in 2025. To the delight of the Hamburg city government, operating profit rose by 25.7% to €117.1 million. Hamburg holds a 50.1% stake in HHLA. The difference is owned by MSC, the world’s largest shipping company, based in Geneva, Switzerland. In addition, the Chinese state-owned company Cosco Shipping Ports has held a 24.9% stake in an HHLA terminal in the Port of Hamburg since June 2023.
Shipping lines invest increasingly in terminals
CMA CGM’s entry into Eurogate illustrates a growing trend: Shipping lines acquire increasingly stakes in terminal operators in key ports in order to stabilize their fleet’s schedules. Recent figures from Hapag-Lloyd show how successful this strategy is. Last August, schedule adherence on routes jointly operated under the Gemini flag (H-L + Maersk) was just under 90%, setting new standards in the industry. Hapag-Lloyd manages around 20 terminals worldwide through its subsidiary Hanseatic Global Terminals, including nine on the Pacific coast of Latin America. “We will continue to pursue this investment strategy consistently,” announced CEO Habben Jansen in a call with media people last Thursday (13NOV25).
Carbon neutral by 2025
In addition, the fleet will grow by 22 new container ships below the 5,000 TEU threshold in order to strengthen the feeder network of the hubs jointly operated by H-L and its partner Maersk and to decommission older ships that burden H-L’s environmental balance sheet due to their greenhouse gas emissions, the manager said. “We will operate our fleet in a climate-neutral manner by 2045,” the group’s CEO assured. Words that were certainly welcomed by delegates attending the COP 30 climate conference which took place at the same time in the Brazilian city of Belem, Brazil, 8,100 km away from Hapag-Lloyd’s HQ in Hamburg. Especially after the International Maritime Organization’s (IMO) Net Zero agreement for a global fuel standard and a global price on shipping emissions failed at the end of October due to opposition from the Trump administration. Now, the agreement is to be voted on again by IMO member countries in a year’s time.
