Maersk redesigns ocean network in West, Central Asia connecting world

July 15, 2021: Maersk today announced that it is redesigning its ocean network in West & Central Asia that connects countries including India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, UAE and Saudi Arabia to the world. 

As a part of redesigning the network, the ME6 service, as well as transhipment on AE1 at Colombo, will be discontinued.

“The changes in the network are primarily aimed at improving speed to market, providing higher predictability and offering more flexibility to customers’ supply chains,” reads the release.  

Improved speed to market
•    The new ME4 service will offer direct coverage between Doha and North Europe, thus improving speed to market by up to 5 days and by up to 6 days from Jebel Ali to West Africa for the majority of customers.

•    The ME3 service connecting fresh produce exporters from Pakistan to Russia will see an improvement. This will further reduce the wastage of fresh produce by maintaining its integrity through end-to-end cold chain logistics offered by Maersk in Pakistan.

•    The FI3 service will change from fortnightly to weekly giving frequent
options for importers getting cargo from the Far East into North India.

Improved predictability
•    The ME7 service will connect South India’s lifestyle, retail and automotive manufacturing sector directly to Europe. The cargo will thus flow smoothly without getting affected by unforeseen delays in case of congestion.

•    The ME7 service will also provide a direct and regular rotation between
the hubs of Colombo and Salalah, thus letting customers have a more flexible option of moving their cargo.

•    The new FI4 service, that combines previous Jade Express and Chennai
Express, will connect South East Asia with India and Pakistan on a single direct service.

Mads Skov-Hansen, head of liner operations cluster, Maersk West & Central Asia, said, “The unprecedented scale of operational challenges restricting supply during the pandemic and the strong demand surge in parallel led to significant bottlenecks, capacity issues and unforeseen delays across supply chains. This prompted us to redesign our ocean network to overcome these challenges and make our customers’ supply chains more resilient.”

Bhavan Vempati, regional head of ocean management, Maersk West & Central Asia, said, “Our customers deserve a predictable service that will allow them to plan their supply chains better. With our redesigned ocean network, we are not only providing our customers with predictability and resilience but also greater speed to market allowing them to optimise their inventories and operations to meet the surge in demand with a competitive edge.”