HMM’s unionized staff, operating around half of HMM’s container ship fleet, had voted in favor of a strike in August if no agreement was reached, while around 300 seafarers had signed resignation letters and threatened to join rival carriers.

A wide-ranging plan by South Korea to bolster its container shipping sector is driven in part to reverse the loss of business and weakening of logistics networks for South Korean shippers following the 2016 collapse of Hanjin Shipping.

South Korean container lines HMM and SM Line will inject more than 82,000 TEU of monthly capacity on the trans-Pacific and Asia–Europe trades via extra loaders and the accelerated deployment of newbuild ships on existing loops.

MSC has thrown its hat into the Asia-Europe rail ring, offering an intermodal connection that mirrors the sea-air service launched by Maersk two years ago.