South Korea’s Hyundai Merchant Marine (HMM), the world’s eighth-largest container shipping company, has officially withdrawn its offer to acquire SK Shipping’s tanker and bulk carrier assets, marking the official end of months of negotiations.
As the valuation gap persists, HMM is struggling to finalize the acquisition. SK Shipping’s controlling shareholder, Hahn & Company, has terminated HMM’s preferred bidder status and will seek a new bidder.
It was reported that the two parties were unable to narrow the gap in their price expectations. As a result, HMM decided to abandon its pursuit of acquiring any SK Shipping assets and instead shift its strategic focus to expanding its transport capacity through new ship orders.
Last September, HMM officially announced a massive investment plan to achieve sustainable growth by 2030, totaling 23.5 trillion won (US$17.48 billion). The investment will be split across four key areas: container shipping (12.7 trillion won), bulk shipping (5.6 trillion won), integrated logistics (4.2 trillion won), and competitiveness enhancement (1 trillion won). By 2030, HMM’s container fleet will nearly double in size, while its tanker and dry bulk fleets will nearly triple in size.
In the container shipping sector, HMM plans to invest 11 trillion won (US$7.95 billion) to increase its container ship fleet to 130 ships with a capacity of 1.5 million TEUs. This is intended to prepare for the restructuring of global container shipping alliances and strengthen the competitiveness of its core business. In conjunction with the fleet expansion, HMM will also invest 1.7 trillion won (approximately US$1.229 billion) in containers to improve operational efficiency. Alphaliner data shows that HMM’s current container fleet is approximately 868,200 TEUs.
To meet market demand for environmentally friendly transportation, HMM plans to purchase approximately 70 green ships by 2030 and establish a carbon-neutral ecosystem across all transportation sectors by 2045.
In the dry bulk and tanker sectors, HMM plans to invest 5.6 trillion won to expand its fleet of tankers and bulk carriers from the current 36 to 110 ships (12.56 million deadweight tons). This will enhance profitability by building a stable portfolio that is not heavily weighted towards a specific bulk market (tankers/dry bulk). The company also plans to diversify its business by expanding into environmentally friendly energy transportation and acquiring a significant market share at an early stage.