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The story
History
Early history
OOCL was founded by C. Y. Tung in 1947 as the Orient Overseas Line. OOCL was the first Asian-based shipping line to transport containerized cargo across the Pacific, doing so in 1969. Consequently, the company was renamed Orient Overseas Container Line. In April 2003, OOCL took delivery of the SX-Class OOCL Shenzhen, the largest container ship ever built at the time, at 8,063 TEU. In 2006, it lost its title to the Emma Mærsk. At its peak, OOCL ran a fleet of over 150 freight ships, with a total cargo capacity exceeding 10 million tons; it was one of the world's top seven shipping lines.
At one point it owned the Seawise Giant, the largest ship ever built, having bought it from the shipyard when the previous owners refused delivery.
After C. Y. Tung's death in 1982, C.H. Tung assumed the leadership of Orient Overseas (International) Limited (OOIL), OOCL's parent company.
Bankruptcy and recovery
The company declared bankruptcy in the mid-1980s and the mainland-based Bank of China provided $50 million of the $120 million put together by Henry Fok. Another big contributor to the OOCL bailout was China Merchants, a Hong Kong arm of China's transport ministry.
In 1996, C.C. Tung took over due to C.H. Tung's election as Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.
OOCL briefly operated passenger ships acquiring the Ruahine, Rangitoto and Rangitane from the New Zealand Shipping Company that were renamed Oriental Rio, Oriental Carnival and Oriental Esmeralda to operate round the world services. The services ceased in 1976.
In September 1970, Tung purchased the ocean liner RMS Queen Elizabeth to convert it into a floating university, to be known as Seawise University, as part of the World Campus Afloat programme. On 9 January 1972, the ship caught fire during refurbishing and sank in Hong Kong's Victoria Harbour and the wreckage had to be scrapped three years later.
Current operations
In 1979, OOCL Logistics Ltd. (OLL), the OOIL Group's international freight consolidation and logistics service unit began its operation.
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In recent years, OOCL has taken over a number of shipping lines. These include Furness Withy, Houlder Brothers, Manchester Liners, Shaw Savill, PSNC, Prince Line & the Alexander Shipping Company.
In 2015, OOCL ordered six G-Class container ships. The first of these, the OOCL Hong Kong, was christened on 12 May 2017. The ship became the world's first container ship to exceed 21,000 TEU mark and achieved a Guinness World Record.
In July 2017, the parent company, OOIL, received a US$6.3 billion takeover bid from COSCO Shipping. The bid was accepted subject to shareholder and regulatory approval. The takeover was completed in 2018.
On July 25, 2019, OOCL Hong Kong, the lead ship of the six G-class ships and previously the world’s largest container ship, visited Hong Kong to mark the 50th anniversary of Orient Overseas Container Line (OOCL).
In May 2023, the 24,188 TEU OOCL Spain, which is among the world's biggest container ships, made its first call at the Port of Hamburg.
In April 2026, OOCL announced a new Southeast Asia-Indian Subcontinent service. This service will be launched on April 24, 2026, and follows a port rotation of Laem Chabang, Singapore, Port Klang, Jawaharlal Nehru, Karachi, Port Klang, Singapore, and Laem Chabang.
Information technology
Beginning in 1993, the group adopted the Integrated Regional Information System (IRIS-2), specifically designed for the container shipping industry. IRIS-2 integrates the business processes of all OOCL offices, customers' shipments and financial information into one system. OOCL was a finalist for the Smithsonian Institution Award for Innovation in 1999 for its achievements with IRIS-2.
On 24 April 2018, OOCL announced an agreement with Microsoft Research Asia (MSRA) to investigate the potential of Artificial Intelligence to improve network operations and efficiencies for the shipping industry.
From Wikipedia’s article on OOCL, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4